


Coffee to the Crotch

by cheeriosx



Category: None - Fandom
Genre: Coffee Shop Owner-Amara, F/F, F/M, FireFighter-Julian, Kennedy is a bitch, Might be some Angst, Sick!Amara, So she works at Walmart, Tahani is an upcoming lawyer, The Brooks are so lovable, The Kingstons do not know what to do with Amar, Youtuber-Amara, big families, dialysis patient amara
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-11
Updated: 2018-02-13
Packaged: 2018-09-11 03:45:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 21,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8952586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cheeriosx/pseuds/cheeriosx
Summary: Kennedy let out a cackle, “You have got to be kidding me!”“No,” Amara snapped.“He actually compared your hair to a poodle?”“Yeah, I was a bit surprised too.”“So, what did you say?”“I didn’t say anything. I tossed my latte in his face,” Amara crossed her arms over her chest.





	1. Chapter 1

Kennedy let out a cackle, “You have got to be kidding me!”

“No,” Amara snaps.

“He actually compared your hair to a poodle?” Kennedy lets out another cackle.

“Yeah, I was a bit surprised too.”

“So, what did you say?”

“I didn’t say anything. I tossed my latte in his face,” Amara crosses her arms over her chest.

“Wait Amara!” Kennedy shouts scandalized.

“What? I mean I get my hair was in a bun, and my baby hairs were sticking out, but I am not a damn dog! And I also suffered here! That was a fresh vanilla latte!”

Kennedy rolls her eyes, “Bless this child. On another note, can we get take-out?”

“Dude no, we had take-out yesterday and you ate all of it. We are not broke college students; so we should not be eating like we are. And plus I’m already hooked up,” Amara gestures at the cart containing her dialysis machine that was sitting by the stairs.

Kennedy looks at Amara from her laid out position on the couch, “You literally just got hooked up, and it has to sit for two hours, you know you want food.”

Amara sighs, “Look we can go to that new-ish restaurant off of Fifth Avenue,”

“The Palace? I’m pretty sure that’s what it’s called.”  
“Yeah, I heard it’s pretty good,”

“You mean you looked it up on Yelp and decided it was good enough,” Kennedy says sarcastically.

Amara sticks her tongue out at Kennedy and walks up the three stairs that separated the bedrooms from the living room. She pushes the cart back in its corner and proceeds to unhook herself from the machine. Amara then goes to her closet and pulls out a pair of jeans, and a nicer shirt, and carries them to her bathroom.

“We need our eyebrows threaded; we are a little bit thick,” Amara sighs at her reflection and pulls out her tweezers and went after the stray hairs.

“Okay Amara let’s go!” Kennedy marches in with sunglasses perched on top of her head, and purposefully left untied converse.

“I haven’t even changed yet and you know it,” Amara huffs and shucks off her sweatpants and bleach stained shirt, trading them for the pair of jeans and a sweater.

“Which vehicle would you like to take?” Amara asks pulling the shirt over her head.

“The Evoque, I love the seat warmers,” Kennedy claps, and then tilts her head to the side.

“Both of my vehicles have seat warmers?” Amara follows Kennedy out of her room and grabbed the keys to her Range Rover Evoque when they passed through the kitchen.

They walk out to the garage and Kennedy hit the button to open the garage. They went to Amara’s silver Evoque and black Mercedes GLC that were combat parked in the driveway next to Kennedy’s Honda that was crookedly parked.

“I personally think the Evoque has better warmers than the Benz,” Kennedy says sliding into the seat.

“If anything the Benz should have better warmers than the Evoque, I paid more for the Benz,” Amara argues.

Kennedy rolls her eyes as Amara starts up the vehicle, and the car beeps as Amara’s phone connects to the Bluetooth. Soon the car was blasting withTori Kelly’s _Hollow._ Amara zooms down the driveway and onto the street, checking her rearview for Paul and Nathaniel’s SUV.

“How was work today?” Amara asks making pointless conversation.

Kennedy gives her a look but sighs, “It was fine, and Miranda got fired today.”

“What!” Amara shrieks, “What happened?”

“She yelled at a customer who was trying to use WIC.”

“Wait why?”

“If you let me finish, I’ll tell you,” Kennedy warns.

“Watch the attitude,” Amara points a finger.

Kennedy rolls her eyes once again, “Anyway! With WIC you have to buy off-brand baby stuff, otherwise it’s not going to go thru. The lady had all name-brand stuff, and Miranda was telling her that she wasn’t going to be able to use WIC to pay for this. The lady was like ‘blah, yes I can I did it last time.’ So Miranda called the manager to tell the lady otherwise, and he also told her that she had to get off-brand and she got pissed. So she starts yelling at us that she can, and Miranda, well, she went off.”

Kennedy starts flailing in the seat, “Mars you should’ve seen it! I don’t think Miranda’s face has ever gotten that red before, I was dying.”

Amara shoots her a curious glance, “So what happened with the lady?”

“Oh, she got even more pissed now that someone was actually yelling back. She gave the manager a look like a ‘ _are you really going to let her speak to me that way?’_ _kind of look._ Miranda got fired on the spot, so she took off her vest and knocked down all the candy shelves and walked out,” Kennedy shrugs.

“Well you had a fun day at work,” Amara comments and then sighs. “Why is there so much traffic right now? It’s only three o’clock; all of you shouldn’t be off yet,”

“How was work for you?” Kennedy interrupts quickly changing the subject before Amara went on a tangent about the traffic.

Amara freezes and gets a weird look on her face, “I didn’t tell you the full story about the guy who said my hair looked like a poodle.”

Kennedy sits up in her seat and gets comfortable knowing Amara was about to give her a story.

“So first of all the jackass, orders a damn twenty ounce, non-fat, no foam, no water, six pump, extra hot chai tea and walks away. I’m already mad because what the hell did this guy just order? I make it and I call him Lord Voldemort and he kind of looks at me and says that’s not his name. I say obviously but the magic potion you put in that damn cup made the name fit.”

“Amara you can’t call people Lord Voldemort!” Kennedy giggles.

“Yes the hell I can, and I did. Anyway! So he starts checking me out, and asks me if I had a long night. And I say why yes I did, three of my employees called in sick and there are only two of us here. So yes! I am having a long night. Then he’s looking at me and then says your hair looks like a poodle. And _that’s_ when I tossed my latte in his face because what the hell dude? You don’t tell a black woman that her hair looks like a poodle, he was asking for it. ”

“Amara Elizabeth Kingston, that’s,” Kennedy starts.

“No, go kick rocks! He called my hair a damn poodle, I can call him Lord Voldemort and I can throw extra hot coffee in his face if I want to! He deserved it! But then, he’s like all right then Amara, I’ll catch you later with coffee dripping down his face. And I told him to eat dirt and get out,” Amara finishes.

“Okay, I have a question,” Kennedy raises her hand.

“What?”

“Why do you remember what he ordered?”

“Probably because I’m holding a grudge, and if I hear that crap again I’m going to be pissed,” Amara grunts. “I hate people, I really do. I don’t know why I opened a café.”

Kennedy laughs, “You opened a café because you wanted to be cheaper than Starbucks, and prove to your parents that you are not just the spoiled, entitled child that they claim you are frequently.”

“Whatever,” Amara pulls into The Palace parking lot and they come to a slow in front of the door.

Kennedy’s mouth was open, and Amara’s eyes were wide.

“I-I thought this was a low-key restaurant, not this,” Kennedy stutters shaking her head.

The Palace was more of an upscale restaurant; it was literally a small palace, complete with a valet and door attendant. Definitely a white tablecloth restaurant, not fit for jeans and a sweater.

“Well, uh, we’re a little underdressed don’t you think,” Kennedy stutters out.

“Very,” Amara nods her head quickly turning the car around and heading back towards the house.

“I feel like I should put on pearls,” Amara mutters to herself.

“Do not.”

“Kennedy you saw how those people were dressed in there!” Amara shouts.

“I did, but I don’t think it requires pearls!”

“Bleh, eat dirt,” Amara waves a hand in Kennedy’s direction.

When they pull back into the driveway ten minutes later, they both make a run for the front door.

“Open the door!” Kennedy shouts.

“You better calm that ass down,” Amara snaps unlocking the door. When Kennedy ran around her, Amara sticks out a foot causing Kennedy to trip into the couch.

The couch cushion muffled the ‘bitch’ that Kennedy shouts.

Amara let out a cackle, walking to her room and into the closet. She flicks through the racks of clothes on the left, and then glances over to the other wall.

“Mars, what are you wearing?” Kennedy yells from her room.

“I don’t know yet!” Amara yells back.

Amara eyes the dark pink dress with a deep V-neck neckline, and glances in the mirror. She checks her legs and deems them good enough to wear a dress. The dress is the same shade of pink as the flowers on her forearm so she decides not to cover them. Quickly putting the dress on, Amara decides that her neck is too bare for the dress. She grabs her gold chain that her oldest brother Jaleel brought back from Afghanistan and put it on.

Making sure the dress wasn’t tight enough to be outlining her catheter belt, Amara walks back to her bathroom and groans at her hair. Hating herself for not straightening her hair this week, she sprays water on it and bends over brushing her hair upwards. She makes a quick fishtail braid up the back of her head and then blindly grabs for bobby pins to hold it down, coming up empty. She straightens back up and checks the drawer again and it’s still empty of bobby pins.

“Kennedy Jei! Did you take my bobby pins?” Amara yells holding the braid. There was a thump and then Kennedy’s heavy footsteps came down the hallway. Kennedy smoothly slid into the bathroom holding something behind her back.

“I would never, ever, come into your bathroom and take something Mars,” Kennedy denies.

“Yeah uh-huh, what’s behind your back?” Amara scoffs holding the braid in place.

“I have no idea what you’re referring to. But I think you’re really rocking the strawberry blonde hair color, it really suits your skin complexion, oh and your eyes,” Kennedy inches against the wall.

“Which is exactly why you shouldn’t have my bobby pins! Our hair colors no longer match! With that being said, I’m going to close my eyes for point-two-three seconds. In those seconds, I want you to drop whatever you have behind your back in the sink,” Amara closes her eyes.

There’s a quick clatter in the sink and then the slapping of Kennedy’s footsteps down the hallway.

Amara opens her eyes and ‘surprisingly’ there were her bobby pins. She sighs and continues doing her hair, making a pineapple on top of her head. She turns around with a hand-mirror to make sure there are no stray hairs lingering. She makes quick work of doing her makeup, once more pulling the stray hairs on her eyebrows.

Amara walks back to her closet, and grabs her nude red bottoms and slips them on her feet. She rubs her hands absently over the flower tattoo on the back of her ankles.

“Kennedy are you ready?” Amara calls walking down the hallway. Bear, her three-year old German shepherd perks his head up at her when she crosses in front of him, she makes kissy faces at him, and his tail thumps against his bed.

“No! What am I supposed to wear?” Kennedy yells back.

Amara huffs and walks in Kennedy’s room, and takes note of the clothes thrown across the room, and the god-awful smell emitting from somewhere. _She’s your friend, she’s your friend, she’s your friend_ Amara thinks to herself, and she takes a deep breath to suppress her slowly upcoming anger.

“Where are you?”

“In the closet,” Kennedy calls.

Amara walks towards the closet, and sees Kennedy under a mountain of clothes, “You know we have these things called hangers, and this other thing called a dresser where we put our clothes so we don’t have them all over the floor.” Another deep breath, exhale, _you can’t go to jail for murder Amara._

“Shut up,” Kennedy whines. “I’ll pick it up later.”

Amara scans the floor, eyebrows rising at the amount of plaid that Kennedy had in her closet.

“Um, do you need to tell me something?” Amara snorts.

“No I’m not a lesbian, I just like plaid.”

Amara nods snorting again she steps carefully over the clothes and begins digging. She picks up a high-low black dress that has a gold belt around it and a pair of gold sandals.

“Here,” Amara thrusts the outfit at Kennedy.

“You’re a babe, and I’m forever grateful,” Kennedy grabs the outfit and leaps over the clothes and into her bathroom.

Amara rolls her eyes, and walks carefully out of the death trap that is Kennedy’s room. She grabs the keys for her Mercedes and presses the auto-start button on the remote.

Amara picks up her phone, and logs onto the Twitter app. She scrolls through her timeline, re-tweeting people’s request for her to do challenges on her YouTube page.

“Any day now Kennedy!” Amara yells; then she hears Kennedy stomping down the hallway, struggling to put her belt on.

“I’m ready!” Kennedy flips her hair over her shoulder then looks at Amara approvingly. “You look cute as hell.”

“Thank you, let’s go,” Amara walks out the front door and back into the car with Kennedy trailing behind.

~~

When they reach the restaurant once again two of the valet boy’s jog over to the Mercedes opening their doors.

“Hello ladies,” the boy on Kennedy’s side greets them. Kennedy smiles at him, and let him help her out of the vehicle.

Amara pats the boys’ cheek and smiles, “If you scratch my car, I’ll fight you.”

The boy glances at Amara with a wary smile.

“She’s only joking,” Kennedy walks pass him and he sighs with relief. “Just a wee bit,” and his smile drops.

“Booth or table?” the host, Hannah, asks when Kennedy joins Amara.

“Booth!” they chime together.

Hannah leads them to a booth towards the center of the restaurant and places menus in front of the two seats.

“Your server will be Julian, he’ll be with you in a moment,” Hannah says and then she walks away.

“What are you getting?” Kennedy asks opening the menu.

“The spinach dip or the spinach artichoke, whichever one they have. That’s literally the only thing I eat anymore, eight times out of ten whatever else makes me nauseous,” Amara sighs.

Kennedy flips through the menu, eyes quickly scanning the pages; “Well my dear, the spinach dip is not listed on this menu.”

“What!” Amara shrieks grabbing for the menu. “But why not?”

Kennedy shrugs in response and Amara pulls out her phone starting a game of Trivia Crack with ‘karatekid808’ her longtime opponent.

“What are you going to get now?”

Amara glances at the menu, “These shrimp tacos look good, so I guess those. Seafood surprisingly doesn’t make me nauseous. ”

Amara flips the menu closed and pushes it towards the middle of the table. She spins on Trivia Crack and lands on the crown. She picks Geography, her worst category; she guesses and got it right.

“I’m going to get the Cajun pasta,” Kennedy says placing her menu on top of Amara’s.

Amara spins again and lands on the Entertainment category.

“Cool beans, hey real quick. In the show The Simpsons what kind of beer does Homer drink?”

“It has man in the title I think,” Kennedy guesses, Amara went with it and it was wrong.

“That was wrong you half eaten-,“ Amara begins her insult.

“Sorry about the wait ladies, can I get you a sweet tea or Sprite to drink?” a deep, husky voice asks.

Amara looks up and her first thought is _holy shit, fine chocolate_ and then she recognizes the man standing above them and immediately scowls, “Oh hell no.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Oh you’re talking about that,” Lou scrunches her face up.  
> “What?”  
> “A whole shit storm of shit Julian.”  
> “Please elaborate.”  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hellooooo, if you're actually reading the story, you've noticed that I've changed names once again. Sorry I'm so indecisive. Here's the new chapter!

Aside from his coffee shop experience at _Caffeinated Fumes_ this morning Julian was actually having a very good day. Except for when the barista, Amara, tossed a very hot latte in his face because he accidently said her hair looks like a poodle. He had meant to compliment the various tattoos on her forearms, but his foot had been in his mouth.

When he pulls into The Palace’s employee parking spot, he runs inside because of course he’s late. He goes to the hostess for the night, Hannah, and signs his name in, then proceeds to roll his eyes when Lou greets him.  He attempts to run away from her large smile, and the evil glint in her eyes.

“There’s already two waiting for you JB!” Hannah calls out after him.

“Jules, there are two pretty ladies sitting in your section. You can date one of them,” Lou rushes out walking with him.

“You’re worse than my sisters,” Julian mutters tying his apron around his waist.

Lou scoffs, “You love us anyway.”

“Unfortunately,” Julian puts his notepad in his apron and tucks a pen behind his ear, and six more in his apron. Stuffing a handful of napkins and straws into his apron he hustles out towards the two ladies.

“Sorry about the wait ladies, can I get you a sweet tea or a Sprite to drink?” Julian greets and looks up into those beautiful weird eyes of the girl from the coffee shop.

“Oh hell no,” Amara snaps.

“Hey! It’s you!” Julian shouts pointing a finger.

“Yes me, and unfortunately you,” Amara mutters.

“Amara!” her friend hisses.

Amara glares at her and then gives Julian a scathing look, “We’re both drinking Sprite, mix mine with Root Beer and also a water with lemon. I will be having the crispy shrimp tacos with a side salad, ranch for the sauce. Kennedy here will be having the Cajun pasta. Tell the chef to be light on the seasoning.”

Julian scrambles to write it down and then Kennedy hands him the menus with a tight smile.

“I’ll have that right out,” Julian says shocked at the obvious dismissal; Amara makes a shooing motion with her hand and then picks up her phone again as Julian stomps away.

Lou is waiting for him by the drink fountain after he pins up the order, “How’d it go?”

“Someone pissed in Amara’s cereal this morning, I’ll tell you that. I mean I get that I said her hair looked like a poodle but it was by accident!” Julian seethes scooping ice into the cups.

“You said that a black woman’s hair looked like a poodle! Julian Easton Brooks! You should know better than that! Especially considering that you are a black man!” Lou slaps his arm.

“I didn’t mean to! It literally just came out of my mouth! Amara’s hair was up in a bun, and it was so curly Lou. I didn’t know curls could be so, curly, I was mesmerized,” Julian defends himself. He moves to the computers to put Amara and Kennedy’s order in the queue.

“But how do you know her name?” Lou questions.

“I wanted to try a different coffee place, Starbucks is getting expensive. While I was walking down Second Street, I saw _Caffeinated Fumes_ , and I was like why not,” Julian shrugs.

“Did you order that complicated nonsense chai tea,” Lou shouts slapping his arm once more.

“It’s delicious and I will continue to drink it!” Julian argues.

“You’re so weird,” Lou sighs.

Julian sticks his tongue out at Lou and grabs Amara and Kennedy’s drinks, hurriedly bringing them back to their table.

When he set the drinks down the table jostles slightly, and Amara glares over at Kennedy with a firm, “No.”

Julian glances at her and then walks away. Another server, Chanel, is clearing a table so he grabs the spray bottle from the host booth and sprays the table down for her. When he’s finished, he heads back to the kitchen to see if his order is ready.

It’s not so, Julian pulls out his phone and plays back ‘cupackefiasco’ on Trivia Crack his long time rival on this stupid game. His rival already had two characters and the game just started. He earns a character from landing on the crown but answers wrong on an Entertainment question.

He perks up at the sound of Lou calling him.

“Julian! Can you help me bring this out?” Lou yells. Julian rounds the corner and sees three large trays filled with plates.

Julian grabs one of the trays and follows Lou out to table fourteen with a tray jack hanging off his arm. Julian’s eyes widen at the sight of Lou’s current table; the couple had six kids, who all looked under twelve. The children were screaming their heads off and throwing chips and quéso at each other. Lou grimaces, and sits down the plates. They both walk away from the table and back into the kitchen area.

“Are they feeding an army?” Julian quietly asks.

“The mom said, and I quote ‘my kids eat like t-rexes, and I regret having six of them.’ End quote,” Lou sighs.

“Jesus H. Christ,” Julian mutters as he peeked out the small window on the kitchen door.

“JB, order up!” the kitchen manager, David, calls to Julian. He went up to get it and then heads over to Kennedy and Amara’s table.

“Alright ladies, here we go,” Julian set down their food. “Can I get you anything else?”

“No we’re good, thank you,” Kennedy said while Amara continues to play on her phone.

The table was jostled once again and Amara jumps.

“What the hell,” Amara asks.

“Put your phone down and eat your food Kingston,” Kennedy chides.

Amara scoffs and pushes her plate forward to continue playing on her phone, “I’m trying to beat my nemesis, thank you very much.”

Julian walks away when Kennedy throws a piece of bread at Amara, thinking about Amara’s last name.

“Where have I heard Kingston before?” Julian asks Lou when he gets back to the kitchen.

“Well, y’know there is a fairly large building that has the name on it, and you’ve probably been seen by one Doctor Jaleel Kingston Senior. Also like every third governor, and every fifth mayor has been someone named Kingston, there’s literally a thousand of them,” Lou shrugs.

Julian gives her a look, “I actually have seen Doctor Kingston before, but it’s something else. Did we go to high school with the Kingstons? I remember seeing something about like a fire or something?”

“Oh that,” Lou scrunches her face up.

“What?”

“A whole shit storm of shit Julian that happened junior year.”

“Please elaborate.”

Lou sighs and puts down the dishrag, “You remember Ethan Roberts?”

“How can I not? He literally sat in front of me in biology just so he could fart! No matter where I sat he would do it! Plus, he just gave off weird vibes I tried to avoid him.”

Lou waves him off, “Besides that dork, he was totally gone on Amara throughout high school. He would leave her love notes and crap in her locker, and there was a rumor that he had attempted to watch her in the girls locker room while she was changing but the coach stopped him for like gym stuff, whatever.”

“Really?” Julian asks surprised.

“Yeah total weirdo, anyways I guess Amara got fed up with his advances and told him under no circumstances would he, quote ‘be getting a piece of this jelly’ and told him to piss off. Ethan did because I saw it, Amara can be a little terrifying,” Lou laughs quietly.

 “Any who, I think it was a couple of weeks after this happened that Amara’s parents had to go out of town for her dad’s conference and she was supposed to stay at that chick Tahani Zaver’s house for the week while they were gone. Amara said she forgot she was supposed to after track practice, so she was going to take a shower and then head over to Tahani’s house,” Lou hums.

“Where are you going with this?” Julian prompts when Lou looks at her nails too long.

“Oh yeah, I was telling a story. So Amara went to go take a shower, and that’s when Ethan broke in, after y’know he killed the four deputies on duty to find out her address,“ Lou sighs again shaking her head. “Psycho.”

“Why do I not remember this?” Julian inquires.

“If you let me finish,” Lou punctuates every word slapping Julian’s arm.

“Ow, okay!” Julian rubs his arm.

“While Amara was in the shower Ethan was dousing the house with gasoline. He did some weird rope thing on the doors in Amara’s room door and bathroom so she couldn’t get out, and then he set the bitch on fire.”

“What the hell?” Julian quietly asks to himself.

“He barricaded himself in the downstairs bathroom, and barricaded the front door with a bunch of shit from the dining room. A neighbor, who was walking her dog, saw the flames and called the police. Amara was trying to get through the window in her bathroom, but she said that her ass was too fat and she couldn’t get through. Kennedy, the chick eating with Amara, for whatever reason was also in the neighborhood, some people think that she put Ethan up to it, but that’s a completely different gossip column in this town,” Lou waves her hand once again.

“Kennedy claims that she tried to break in the house, and get Amara out. She failed, eventually the firefighters showed up and they had to break in through the basement and move everything from in front of the door so everyone else can get in. ”

“So he basically had all of this planned out to the end,” Julian comments.

“I’m not finished!” Lou shrieks.

“Sorry! Don’t hit me!”

“So the firefighters saw Amara’s car in the driveway, so they were looking for her not Ethan, but Kennedy kept telling them that Ethan was in the house as well, so they went looking for her and him. Obviously they found her in the bathroom passed out from smoke inhalation. Some other guy found Ethan in the bathroom; he had slit his wrists and was bleeding out on the floor. Your dad was the one who got her out, just before the floor caved in. Real heroic if you ask me,” Lou finishes and then looks at him with an eyebrow lifted.

“Dude what the hell?”

“I know! Amara had third degree burns on her legs, had to do physical therapy for a year and a half I think after they finished all the skin grafting. When her parents got back in town that day, the police were at Ethan’s house, because it was so glaringly obvious that it was arson. But they were going to try to get him on premeditated murder and dude,” Lou starts laughing clutching her stomach.

“What?”

“He had a shrine dedicated to Amara in his closet. Her parents went off. They sued the pants off them, yelling at them for not knowing what Ethan was doing and what he was planning. Ethan is locked up in the psych-ward somewhere, still claiming his undying love for Amara and Amara’s kidney condition got worse. She had to start dialysis on top of physical therapy, and she had to get put on the transplant list and everything.”

“Why do you know all of this?”

“I know everything,” Lou shrugs.

“When did she get a kidney condition?”

“Remember she got diagnosed freshmen year? She was all swollen around her ankles and eyes? She was literally hospitalized for like a month, the swelling was so bad. She literally gained like fifty pounds of water weight, Julian really?” Lou sighs exasperated.

“Where was I freshmen year?”

“Mrs. Archer made the whole grade sign that big ass card, that she sent to Amara when she was in the hospital. Amara was waddling around like one of those sumo wrestlers,” Lou poked him.

“Okay, I sort of remember, everyone started making fun of her for all the weight she gained.”

“Yeah her kidneys retain fluids instead of releasing them like ‘normal’ kidneys. FSGS, aka Nephrotic Syndrome. ”

“I’m pretty sure I did a paper on that.”

“But Amara is such a champ, I can’t believe I didn’t recognize her. That strawberry blonde color really suits her,” Lou sighs.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, she looks like she did in high school but with obviously more assets,” Lou gestures at her own boobs.

“Gross,” Julian made a face at her.

“Boy please, like you didn’t stare at her boobs when you went over there. I can see them from here those things are glorious,” Lou deadpans.

Julian scoffs, and walks away going to check on Amara and Kennedy.

“I’ve told you, your doctor has told you, that you cannot take seventeen medications on an empty stomach!” Kennedy is whisper yelling when Julian walks up.

“I had peanut butter toast and Jell-O,” Amara yells back.

“Amara! Your doctor says you need to eat every six hours, a full meal, and take your medicine. You’re taking seventeen medications; you can’t act like a damn five-year old about this!”

“You take seventeen medications?” Julian blurts causing both of them to snap their heads towards them.

“Yes,” Amara replies eyeing him warily.

“Seventeen medications that she is supposed to take with a full meal. Not a damn piece of toast and Jell-O,” Kennedy raises her voice again.

“It had peanut butter on it! It’s protein!” Amara snaps throwing bread.

Julian squints at Amara, trying to figure out where the burns once were. _Did she have an awesome plastic surgeon?_ Julian thinks.

“It’s not polite to stare,” Amara states.

Julian shakes his head at her, and picks up Kennedy’s cup and empty plate, making a mental note to bring back a to-go box and refill their drinks. He grabs the to-go box after depositing the cup in the sink, and gets new ones. While he waits for the glasses to fill up, Lou came bustling back in out of breath.

“I’m never having more than one child. If I ever get pregnant after the first, slap me silly okay?” Lou gasped out.

Julian laughs, “Are the kids still acting up?”

“They ordered more food Julian!” Lou let’s her head fall on his chest.

“No they didn’t,” Julian says in disbelief rubbing Lou’s arm.

“Oh but they did,” Lou sobs stepping back.

Julian shakes his head and walks out with the to-go box and the glasses. He sits them down on the table.

“So what do you ladies have planned for the week?” Julian asks attempting to make conversation.

“Uh, classes at ten-thirty for me and class at eight for Kennedy,” Amara sticks her tongue out. “Someone couldn’t get out of morning classes, and she didn’t want to do night classes.”

“I was out of country! By the time I got back most of the afternoon classes were filled!” Kennedy shouts.

“School comes first honey,” Amara baby talks.

“What are your majors?” Julian asks.

“Kennedy’s major is engineering, and I just went back for my second degree in behavioral science,” Amara proudly states while Kennedy whoops.

“Wow,” Julian laughs. “Are you getting desert tonight or should I get the checks ready?”

“Dessert!” Amara cheers.

“We only have three dessert items. A cookie monster, today’s cheesecake which I think is turtle, and a big brownie that comes with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top,” Julian recites.

Kennedy and Amara look at each other lifting their eyebrows. A silent debate exchanges between them. Amara narrows her eyes, and Kennedy shakes her head slightly.

“What is the cookie monster?” Amara asks still staring at Kennedy.

“It’s a big cookie with caramel fudge drizzled over it with whip cream and ice cream,” Julian sighs picturing it in his head.

Amara and Kennedy continue to trade glances.

“Fine!” Kennedy throws her hands up. “You can have your own dessert! One cookie monster and one brownie please.”

Amara claps her hands in victory laughing. Julian walks away from the table, and back into the kitchen, only to be stopped by the sight before him.

“Oh what am I looking at?” Julian asks eyeing the new mountain of food that Lou was meticulously placing on the trays.

“They ordered another round remember?” Lou shrugs, “Can you help me again?”

Julian nods, and they pick up the trays and bring them out.

“Jesus Christ,” Julian mutters watching the kids devour their food. He walks back with Lou to the kitchen. He places the dessert order in front of David and raps his knuckles on the table.

“Hey David,” Julian singsongs.

“JB,” David lifts an eyebrow that said ‘back away.’

“You’re so mean to me!” Julian whines and stomps out of the kitchen. He wanders over to Macy by the bar.

“Oh Christ! JB, my hero! Come help me, I have twenty-thousand drinks to make!” Macy shouts when she spots Julian.

He laughs at her exaggeration and moves behind the bar.

He picks up the receipts pouring over the machine, “Which ones do we need to do?”

Macy snatches the wad from him and starts tearing out pages letting them fall to the floor, “These need to be done, and it’s like every table is drinking!”

“What do you mean every table, there’s only four tables here and two of them are Lou’s,” Julian asks confused.

“No, what are _you_ talking about? We have a full house!” Macy points to her left in the twenties, and sure enough there was a full house.

“Well then why aren’t they seated over there?” Julian points behind him in the eighties.

Macy gasps, “Who’s back there? Do we have VIP’s that I don’t know about?”

“Two girls, a couple with six kids, and two guys who aren’t sitting together.”

“Who are the two girls?”

“Amara Kingston and her friend Kennedy.”

Macy squealed, “Are you serious? One of the Kingston clan is in here?”

“What’s the big deal?”

“Well first of all, the two guys who aren’t sitting together are probably her bodyguards. Is one facing the doors, and the other facing Amara?”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah those are her bodyguards,” Macy waves a hand.

“The manager probably did it before Amara even walked in, I didn’t even get the memo, and anyways how do you know their names?” Macy sits another drink on the counter.

“Lou and I apparently went to high school with both of them. I do not remember this, nor do I remember Amara being this ‘famous,’” Julian shrugs.

“No way!”

“Yes way. There was always a bulky dude at the back of some classes I had with Amara, I thought he was the school’s resource officer.”

“You are way too dumb, isn’t your major math?”

Julian rolls his eyes, “My majors are fire science and history. I’m pretty sure Amara has never went through the horrors of cafeteria food. Those guys probably brought her lunch and everything.”

“So lucky,”

“Tell me about it, she wasn’t stuck up or anything as far as I remember. I’m pretty sure she invited the whole grade to her birthday parties every year.”

“Dude you had an awesome childhood.”

“Until junior year anyway,” Julian laughs. “We relocated after the fire,” Julian taps the bell that Macy had on the countertop.

He tosses the towel on the countertop, “I’m going to finish helping Lou, that table she’s waiting on probably ordered a mountain of dessert.” Julian waves to Macy and walks back over to the kitchen.

“Julian what the hell? You left me hanging,” Lou shouts at Julian when she spots him.

“Macy needed help too Lou, you aren’t my only friend,” Julian snarks, following her to the countertop where the desserts were lying.

Lou sticks her tongue out at him, and picks up the tray.

“Only they could make three dessert items look like a buffet,” Julian rolls his eyes at Lou’s retreating figure.

“Hey Julian, this is our new worker Tara, she’s going to shadow while it’s slow tonight,” the service-manager Jeffery says approaching with a redheaded girl.

Julian turns around slowly, and is hit with a small sense of deja-vu, but he shakes it off, “Uh hey, Julian Brooks.” He stretches out a hand.

Her eyes widens a bit, and then narrow in realization, “Oh, Brooks! I met your dad this morning!”

“Why did you meet my dad?” Julian asks leaning back against the sink.

“My dad and I just got transferred here from the New York Fire Department. Well he did, but I need to make sure he eats right so I transfer schools when he moves,” Tara says nervously.

“What’s your last name again? I don’t remember my dad mentioning any transfers,” Julian asks.

“Jules! Amara wants the checks now,” Lou says banging into the kitchen.

Julian eyes Tara as he pushes off the stove, and walks back to the dining area to print off checks.

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “What’s been up Amara?” Jaleel asks.  
> “Tahani is back,” Amara smirks.  
> Jaleel splutters, “Did you say Tahani?”  
> “Yeah.”  
> “You reunited with your twisted sister?”  
> “We are not twisted!” Amara argues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, so this was the last chapter I wrote before I decided to actually put a plot to this story.

“Yeah, you definitely need to start tapping that,” Kennedy says suddenly causing Amara to choke on her food.

“What?” Amara asks coughing.

“You remembered what he ordered at the shop, and now he’s serving us food. Plus he’s definitely your type, so you have to date him,” Kennedy explains like it all makes sense.

Amara stares at her, questioning their friendship, “So you think I should date him?”

“Yes,” Kennedy nods seriously.

“Artemis just tripped in Olympus,” Amara put her fork down.

‘No, that’s not fair; you can’t bring Artemis into this!”

“Yes I can.”

“No you can’t.”

“I listen to the Greek Gods.”

“The Fates are a part of Greek Mythology,”

“The Fates are a part of all the mythology, everyone just tells their stories differently,” Amara stands up and walks away to find a manager.

“Amara!” Kennedy laughs at her retreating figure.

Amara walks towards the host booth, and waits until the host, Hannah, looks up to smile at her. Hannah’s jaw drops in surprise.

“Hi, can you get your manager for me please?” Amara asks.

Hannah nods her head hurriedly, and scurries off. Amara bops her head to the song in her head.

She does a couple of dance moves, moving her shoulders and sliding across the floor. She spins doing the Michael Jackson pose, and then hears a throat being cleared behind her.

She turns quickly, “Hello.”

“Hello Ms. Kingston, you requested to see me?” the manager, Jeffery, says.

“Yeah I wanted to get kudos to your servers Julian and the girl with blonde hair? I’m five percent sure her name is Lou I went to high school with her. Lou had a table that ordered three rounds of food, and she kept a smile on her face the whole time. And Julian, well he’s putting up with me and Kennedy,” Amara finishes with a smile.

Jeffery looks confused, “You’re not complaining? You’re giving them a compliment?”

“Yes!”

“A compliment?” Jeffery was still confused.

“Do you not know what a compliment is?” Amara frowns.

“N-no, I know what it is Ms. Kingston, I just don’t understand why you are giving one.”

“I always give compliments?” Amara narrows her eyes and walks away from him in a huff.

She grunts when she sits back down at the table where there’s now a cookie monster in her place setting, “The manager questioned me giving a compliment.”

“Why?” Kennedy asks.

“I don’t know. He was all, ‘I don’t know why you Ms. Kingston are giving a compliment,” Amara deepens her voice mocking the manager scooping up the cookie on the spoon.

“Probably because you were bitching when we first got here.”

“I did not!” Amara cries in mock outrage.

Kennedy gave her a look, “Really Mars?”

“What?”

“You literally bitched at Julian when he came over,” Kennedy points out.

“The only reason I bitched at Julian is because he’s the hipster from the coffee shop.”

Kennedy made a noise of confusion.

“I literally told you on the way over here,” Amara groans letting her head fall into her hands.

“Oh you didn’t tell me he was cute!” Kennedy giggles clapping her hands.

Amara puts the spoon in her mouth and groans out, “He winked at me, said a flip comment and left.” She scoops another piece in her mouth, “Oh my gods this is delicious.”

Kennedy stares at her and raises an eyebrow.

“I almost went over the countertop at the amount of sarcasm.”

“No you wouldn’t have. Give him a dirty look with some sarcastic or hurtful remark? Oh hell yeah, that’s Amara Kingston all day, every day. Fight someone? You only do that when you are extra, extra pissed and fed up. I have personally witnessed this side of you.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Meghan Tauke? On the senior trip, She was talking noise about you and Ethan Woods.” Kennedy nods seriously.

“I remember Meghan, but I’m pretty sure I didn’t fight her.”

“Because you didn’t fight her? You annihilated her. She had to get a nose job, and some weird constructive surgery.”

“I’m pretty sure you’re making this up,” Amara rolls her eyes; she distinctively remembers the senior trip to the Caribbean on spring break.

Kennedy’s jaw drops, “Amara comes on! Her parents wanted to press charges but your parents said that she had brought up Ethan and that shut them up pretty quickly.”

“No I didn’t!”

Kennedy huffs, “Amara Elizabeth Kingston! This girl is terrified of you! She’s studying abroad, and when she saw you in the hallways she would run the other way! She ran!”

Amara rolls her eyes.

“There’s a video! There is a damn video! Give me five minutes!” Kennedy whips out her phone and began her search.

Amara sighs, “Where’s Julian, I’m ready to go now. I need to get ready for tomorrow.”

Amara spots Lou and waves at her until she came over.

“Hi! What can I get for you?” Lou asks.

“Can you tell Julian that we’re ready for the checks? It’s going to be on separate tickets.”

“Sure thing,” Lou nods and walks off.

“Found it!” Kennedy shouts causing Amara to jump. “Trevor Mace still had it, almost six years later.”

Kennedy slides her phone across the table and Amara hit play on the video.

_The video starts with Meghan mid-rant crowding around Amara who’s seated at one of the tables reading a book._

_“Amara, I just want to know! Is your crotch some deep dark part of hell that made Ethan go crazy?”_

_“He was already crazy Meghan,” Amara mutters into her book._

_“Was he? Or was it just you?” Meghan asks._

_Amara shrugs wordlessly, and Meghan crowds closer._

_“Because personally in my opinion, I think you’re the crazy one and Ethan was just along for the ride.” Meghan says._

_Amara freezes mid-turn on the books page and stands up making Meghan back up suddenly._

_“So you think you have the whole story huh?” Amara dashes out a quick punch, hitting Meghan in the nose. Meghan swings back, but Amara neatly steps to the side._

_“Ethan was obsessed with me, not the other way around. Ethan tried to burn me alive, not the other way around. Ethan tried to kill me, so stop acting like you know what happened. And mind your fucking business,” Amara finished each sentence with a punch, but the final one knocked Meghan on her ass._

_“Understood?” Amara asked, standing over Meghan. She nodded her head quickly, causing the blood from her nose to spill faster._

_“That goes for the rest of you as well, stop fucking gossiping about shit you have no idea about,” Amara turned and picked up her book walking away._

Amara slides the phone back wordlessly, as the screen went black.

“I believe that’s the most you’ve ever cursed in a single day, believe me now,” Kennedy says tucking her phone away.

“To be honest, I remember spring break, but I don’t remember fighting anyone,” Amara sighs.

“Well you should, Meghan had to get a new nose like I said. She wouldn’t walk anywhere near you, she even transferred schools when we came back.”

“Okay I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” Amara waves a hand.

“But Amara-,” Kennedy starts.

“I said no Kennedy!” Amara yells causing a waiter passing by to trip over his feet.

“Everything okay here ladies?” Julian asks hesitantly approaching the table.

“Fine, someone doesn’t know what no means,” Amara digs in her wallet for her credit card.

Julian sits the checks on the table but Amara handed him her credit card before he walked away while Kennedy stares at Amara with shock.

“I know what no means,” Kennedy dumbly states.

“Do you Kennedy?” Amara asks sarcastically. “When I say I don’t want to talk about something anymore, I expect for you to stop whatever you’re badgering on about. I remember spring break, and you’ve shown me proof that I beat her up. But I do not give a fat monkey’s ass about the fight. So once again, I do not want to talk about it,” Amara finishes sharply.

Kennedy nods her head quickly thoroughly chastised for the night. Amara deeply exhales and picks up her phone seeing that ‘karatekid808’ had played her back on Trivia Crack. Amara hears Julian approaching the table once again, and he hands Amara back her card.

“I just need your autograph by the ‘x’ and you are free to go,” Julian says handing Amara a pen.

Kennedy hands Julian two twenties, “You can keep the change.”

Julian obviously splutters, but nods his head.

Amara scrawls her name lazily on the line and adds forty dollars to the tip line with a smiley face and hands Julian the receipt.

“Thank you for the service tonight,” Amara smiles at him.

“Oh no, thank you for coming to the Palace tonight,’ Julian says and scurries off.

Amara stands up from the table with Kennedy following behind her wordlessly and walks towards the door. Amara smiles at the manager as she walks by him and out the door.

She hands the valet boy her ticket and waits.

“Call yourself an Uber, I don’t want you at the house,” Amara says without turning around.

“What?” Kennedy asks dumbly.

“I don’t want you at the house go stay with your boyfriend.”

“Why?”

“Are you listening? How many times do I need to repeat myself for you? I do not want you in the house,” Amara turns around to face Kennedy.

“But it’s my house too,” Kennedy argues.

“Excuse me?” Amara steps closer, “What bill do you pay?”

Kennedy stood mouth opening and closing; Amara scoffs and rolls her eyes.

“That’s what I thought, so Kennedy. When I ask you to leave, you leave,” Amara walks to the valet when her car approaches.

“Amara!” Kennedy pleads.

“What did I just say about the word ‘no’?” Amara inquires.

“I don’t have any clothes at Marcus’ house,” Kennedy tries to reason.

“You’ve been dating for two years and you have no clothes at his house?” Amara raises an eyebrow, and Kennedy shakes her head in response.

“Well that says something doesn’t it?” Amara hands the valet a ten and slides inside her vehicle.

Kennedy watches in shock as Amara drove off without a backwards glance. When Kennedy concludes that Amara was not coming back, she pulls out her phone, and requests an Uber.

~~

Amara only feels a tad built guilty for dismissing Kennedy so harshly. There was not much traffic now, so Amara makes it home in no time. When she pulls into the driveway, she takes a moment to admire the house that her father built for her when she finished her Masters and decided to go to med school.

All Amara had to do was tell him how many rooms she wanted. The house was all brick, one story with a finished basement, four bedrooms, and three and a half bathrooms.

Her mother Queen-Esther designed the kitchen; since Amara loved to cook she had everything she needed in the kitchen to make the wildest recipes. The dark marble countertops and red cabinets went nicely together. Amara’s mother put individual freezer and refrigerator in the kitchen. There were two ovens stacked on top of each other, and the stove had six eyes on it.

Amara’s bedroom had a large giraffe painted outside of the door, and it was her favorite part of the house. Her walls were painted a dark orange, but one wall was replaced with a whiteboard that acted as a calendar and a place for Amara to do her homework. Her desk was placed against that wall as well. Her bed was a California King doused in pillows, next to it was a large cart that held her dialysis machine, and medical equipment. A small IV pole was hooked up to the machine, along with a blood pressure cuff.

Amara’s closet was a semi-gift from her oldest sister Estelle, who did interior design when she wasn’t at the politician’s office. The closet was a large walk-in with built in shelves, and several racks that were hanging with clothes. The closet had another door inside of it that led to her bathroom.

The bathroom was a light marble tile, and the walls were painted a golden yellow. The shower was also a walk-in with three showerheads sticking out from the walls.

What is now Kennedy’s room was a guest room almost similar to Amara’s own room. The walls were light green and the bed king sized. The closet was also walk in but smaller, and so was the bathroom. The room was completely trashed because Kennedy was nowhere near a tidy person.

The basement was dark, and Amara liked it that way. Her Uncle Leon was amazing with technology, and he set up a projector in the basement, hooked it up the television that was downstairs. The computer drive that was also connected to the television had nothing but movies on it, and he would come by every three months with a new load of movies. There was another guest bedroom in the basement, along with a bathroom.

A knock on the window startles Amara from her thoughts, “Everything okay Ms. Kingston?” Amara’s bodyguard Nathaniel asks. “You’ve been sitting for a while now.”

“Oh I’m fine, just thinking about some changes I’ll be making,” Amara smiles sliding out of the vehicle.

“Alright then, Paul and I are going to a perimeter check ma’am, and then we’ll be back up,” Nathaniel says and walks away towards the SUV.

“Nathaniel?” Amara calls.

“Yes ma’am?”

“Stop calling me ma’am, I’m only twenty-four,” Amara sighs.

“Okay Ms. Kingston.”

“Nathaniel, my name is Amara.”

“Yes, I know that,” Nathaniel looks confused.

“Then why don’t you call me by my first name?”

“I was being professional ma’am,” Nathaniel says.

Amara lifts an eyebrow at the ma’am, “Call me Amara.”

“Okay, Miss Amara,” Nathaniel nods and continues towards the SUV.

Amara huffs at his retreating figure, and skipped inside the house.

“Hey Bear!” Amara calls when she steps inside, and immediately the sound of her German shepherd’s heavy steps was heard on the hardwood floor.

She laughs when Bear jumped up and started licking her face, “Yes, I missed you too. Now get down.”

Amara pats him on the head when he lowers himself down and went to her room, going into her closet.

She pulls off the dress and threw her bra across the room. Absently scratching at her boobs, she shuffled through her t-shirt drawer. She picks up an old t-shirt with ‘MARS’ printed on the back, and grabs a pair of leggings and socks. She stops by her dialysis machine and sees that she still has an hour left to be unplugged.

Amara glances around her, noticing shirts that were out of place; she moves them back to their hangers and places shoes back on the shelves. Walking into her bathroom, she saw that her laundry basket was overflowing; she stuffs the clothes down and drags it to the laundry room.

Quickly separating the clothes she put a load in the washer. She puffs a breath, and starts making her way to the kitchen.

While she was throwing out expired food and leftover takeout containers from Kennedy the doorbell rings causing her to jump; she runs to the door sliding across the hardwood floor, Bear at her heels barking.

“Ms. K- I mean Miss Amara there’s a young lady here to see you. She says her name is Tahani Zaver,” Nathaniel says when Amara opens the door.

Amara raises her eyebrows in disbelief, and leans to the side to see around Nathaniel’s bulking figure, and shrieks, “Oh my G, Tahani!”

Tahani Zaver was a longtime friend of Amara’s. They had been friends since kindergarten when they were paired as ‘buddies’ in class. Tahani moved away after high school, going to USC with a full ride scholarship for track.

“I just transferred to Western! Gram-gram is sick and needs someone to take care of her who doesn’t have a full-time job, aka me,” Tahani smiles.

 Bear cautiously approaches her and goes straight for the crotch causing Tahani to laugh and pet his head.

She steps forward but pauses eyeing Nathaniel, “Am I allowed to hug you?”

“Oh sorry,” Amara laughs. “Nathaniel’s she’s harmless, both of you come in.”

Nathaniel and Tahani step into the house and Amara goes in to hug Tahani, “When did you get in town, and how did you know where I lived?”

“Well I went to see gram-gram first, and when I left her apartment I went to the hospital to tell dad that I made it blah, blah. I ran into your dad on the way to my dad’s office, and he asked me if I had seen you yet. I told him no, and he gave me your address. When I pulled into your driveway, I was checking the address to make sure it was right. The house is beautiful by the way; I thought some old white dude lived here. Then your henchmen here scared the life out of me and searched my car and me. Then he brought me up here, after I told them I was your friend and here I am,” Tahani explains in what seemed to be all one breath.

Amara stares at her for a second before puffing out a laugh, “Did you breathe at all?”

“Maybe?” Tahani smirks.

“Yeah, how much Adderall have you had today?” Amara asked walking back to the kitchen with Tahani following.

Amara stops when she notices Nathaniel still hovering in the back, “Nathaniel do you not remember Tahani from grade school?”

Nathaniel shakes his head frowning, “No ma’am, I do not.”

“Okay I know she wasn’t as crazy as Kennedy was and still is, but this literally my other half,” Amara flails.

Tahani snorts, “I’m actually like the third part of you, Asher is the second half.”

Amara waves her off, “Nathaniel she’s harmless I promise.”

Nathaniel tightly nods and slowly makes his way towards the front door.

Amara sighs at his retreating figure, shaking her head, “I think he’s more paranoid than I am.”

“Isn’t that in his job description?” Tahani asks.

“Shut up, how’s life been treating you?” Amara goes to the sink and wet the dishrag to wipe out the refrigerator.

“USC was amazing, I’m ready for law school. I told them to find a school that would accept my class credits in Virginia, and Western popped up,” Tahani explains.

“You actually followed through with law school?” Amara laughs.

“You actually followed through with med school?” Tahani fires back.

Amara rolls her eyes, and continues wiping out the refrigerator.

“I mean, who would’ve thought though? You in med school gunning to be an orthopedic surgeon and me becoming the best district attorney the streets of Virginia have ever seen!” Tahani exclaims.

“Why do you get a longer introduction?” Amara pauses.

“My name is longer?” Tahani says in a deadpan.

“My name is longer than yours stupid.”

“No it’s not!”

“Tahani, you’re a 3-2-2, and I’m a 3-4-2. Do the math,” Amara patronizes.

“Oh, wow a whole two syllables longer than me,” Tahani frowns.

“How did you think your name was longer?” Amara shoves Tahani.

“I thought your middle name was Elise?” Tahani frowns again and pushes Amara back.

“Why in the hell would my middle name by Elise? It’s Elizabeth.”

“Don’t be rude. You mentioned Kennedy earlier, but where is she?”

“I may or may not have kicked her out for the night,” Amara mutters.

“What she done did now?” Tahani wanders down the hall towards Amara’s room. “Is your room this way or the other way?”

“You’re going the right way,” Amara calls after her. She closes the refrigerator and tosses the dishrag in the sink following Tahani.

“Ew gross,” Tahani points at a picture on the wall. “Why is this hanging up?”

“Well it’s me and you, you’re my best friend. I think that explains it well enough,” Amara shot Tahani a look.

“Even then your ass was big,” Tahani states continuing down the hallway. “This your room?” She eyes the giraffe on the door.

“Yes dork,” Amara sarcastically says.

“Your sarcasm isn’t welcome here _Amara Elizabeth_ ,” Tahani pushes the door all the way open. “Oh this is cute! I have been living in a college dorm for so long; I don’t know what a real room looks like anymore.”

“Dramatic as always,” Amara mutters.

“Can I move in? Where’s the guest room? I can only imagine what it looks like if yours is like this,” Tahani turns around quickly giving Amara puppy eyes.

“I have two actually, there’s one in the basement, and what’s Kennedy’s room.”

“I still can’t believe you’re friends with Kennedy Oatham,” Tahani scrunches her nose up.

“I still don’t understand why you never liked her.”

“I get bad vibes from her. For instance, does she help you pay any bills?”

“Not that I need help paying bills, but no.”

“Does she at least keep her room clean?” Tahani runs out of the room and down to Kennedy’s room.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you!” Amara warns as Tahani reaches the other end.

Tahani opens the door and stumbles back in shock, clearly hit by the smell in Kennedy’s room. She struggles to stand up, trying to close the door back.

“Oh my Gods!” Tahani gasps when she gets the door closed.

“I warned you,” Amara laughs walking back to the kitchen.

“What was that?” Tahani stares at the door in horror.

“That is Kennedy Jei Oatham.”

“It smells like something died in there,” Tahani points to the door with a shaky finger.

“Yeah that’s why the rooms are far apart, on opposite sides. What happens in one room will not be smelt or heard by the other occupants,” Amara nods her head seriously.

“You need to kick her out if she lives like that Amara, and she doesn’t help you pay bills? It’s time for her to go.”

“But she technically doesn’t have anywhere to go, her boyfriend Marcus doesn’t want her to move in with him because she’s a slob. But I want her out for the same reason!” Amara let’s her head drop against the countertop.

“It’s called tough love dear,” Tahani pats Amara on the arm.

Amara sighs, “Do I have to?”

Tahani nods at her.

Amara huffs, “Fine, I’ll tell her tomorrow. Anyway, if you want to shower you can go downstairs. It’s just a showerhead so you just have to turn it on,” Amara explains knowing that Tahani struggles with other people’s bathrooms.

“Got it, be right back,” Tahani jumps down the stairs and out the front door to her car.

Amara picks up the house phone, and dials to the guesthouse where Nathaniel and Paul are.

“Yes ma’am?” Paul answers.

“Hey Paul. In a month’s time, I’m going to be re-doing the room that Kennedy is in. I need a carpenter to replace the wood in that room. Also I need someone else to inspect the walls in that room, I want it re-painted, I’ll pick out colors later,” Amara rushes out.

Amara hears Paul writing it down through the phone, “Alright, anything else ma’am?”

“No that’s all. Thanks Paul,” Amara says.

“You’re welcome Miss Amara,” Paul hangs up and the line goes dead.

Tahani skips in the house, and thunders down the steps to the basement while Amara straightens the cabinet.

“Who leaves this corner of Captain Crunch in the box? This literally could’ve gone into the bowl,” Amara mutters.

She finds three more boxes in the same state, and gets even more pissed.

“Why!” Amara yells looking up.

Amara pauses her mental tirade to tilt her head as she hears Tahani singing Amy Winehouse’s _Tears Dry on Their Own_ in the shower. Amara chuckles at the off-pitch singing, and then decides to mess with her. She quietly walks down the stairs and hovers outside the door waiting for Jade’s part to come.

She gathers her breath and burst into the bathroom, “Whoa, he walks away! The sun goes down!” She sings loudly causing Tahani to shriek and slip.

“Son of a biscuit eating gorilla! Amara! Why would you do that?” Tahani gasps out.

Amara cackles madly, “Stop singing off pitch or I’m going to find Mrs. Blake”

Tahani opens the shower door and stares Amara down, “You wouldn’t.”

Mrs. Blake was possibly the craziest choir teacher Amara and Tahani had ever had in high school. She took no one’s crap and didn’t listen to anyone, unless they sang whatever was needed. Nevertheless, in the end it paid off, they won all of the “Battle of the Choirs’ contests throughout their four years of high school. Mrs. Hollis retired on Amara and Tahani’s last day of school claiming that their class was the best.

“Oh but I would,” Amara smirks.

Tahani scowls at Amara and closes the door. Tahani clears her throat and starts singing in her Soprano voice.

“Love you!” Amara singsongs and closes the bathroom door.

Amara’s phone ringing makes her run faster up the stairs. She slides into the living room, making a dive for her discarded purse on the couch.

“Hello!” Amara yells.

“Why am I looking at what I assume is your ear?” Amara’s oldest brother Jaleel says as greeting.

“I didn’t pay attention to the screen, I just slid and said hello,” Amara says out of breath. She moves to the phone in front of her face. The sight of her brother brings a smile to her face.

“What’s been up Amara?” Jaleel asks.

“Tahani is back,” Amara smirks.

Jaleel splutters, “Did you say Tahani?”

“Yeah.”

“You reunited with your twisted sister?”

“We are not twisted!” Amara argues.

Jaleel gives her a look that says _really?_

“We are not!”

“Mars, every time your English teachers gave y’all a research assignment, _both_ of you did it on famous serial killers!” Jaleel deadpans.

“What’s your point?” Amara scoffs and Jaleel rolls his eyes.

“Anyway, mom called me-“

“Oh so you didn’t actually call to have a chat with your sister. You called to lecture me.”

“She wants you to visit her more often!”

“She lives two hours away! I am currently going through med school and managing a business! If she wants to see me, she can get in that stupid Porsche she bought and come visit me!” Amara yells.

“Are you done?” Jaleel asks.

Amara raises an eyebrow to him in response.

“Great, first things first, mom and dad do not live two hours away. They live an hour and thirty minutes away exactly, if you take Warfield instead of Pioneer. Second, medical school and running a business is not an excuse not to visit the people who raised you. And third, Porsche’s are not stupid.”

“Really?”

“Really,” Jaleel nods seriously.

Amara scoffs, and hangs up the phone tossing it on the nightstand. She reaches for the remotes, and turns on her Apple TV, and clicks on Netflix.

“Oh, what to watch,” Amara mumbles.

“You should watch Containment,” Tahani says popping into the room.

“Well aren’t you a ninja. I’m watching Flashpoint.”

“What part are you at?”

“The episode where Wordy left because of the tremor thing.”

“Ah,” Tahani frowns at the insistent buzzing. “Answer your phone.”

“It’s Jaleel, I’m mad at him.”

Tahani rolls her eyes and reaches over Amara to grab the phone, “Hey big bro!”

“Ah, Thing Two. You and Amara still sound so much alike,” Jaleel says.

“Wouldn’t I be Thing Three? Adrian is her actual twin.”

“Actually, you would be Thing One, because you were born first,” Jaleel says thoughtfully.

“Yeah and cranky butt over here would be Thing Three.”

Amara huffs pointedly and turns up the television.

Tahani rolls her eyes, “Your sister is so temperamental. Why did she hang up on you?”

“Because mom wants to talk to her, but she doesn’t want to talk to mom.”

“Why would you even bring mom into it?”

“Yeah I know, but if she wants dad to give her a good recommendation, she needs to make nice,” Jaleel says raising his voice at the end.

“Why in the hell would I need a letter of recommendation? As soon as anyone hears ‘Kingston’ they bring out a red carpet,” Amara snaps pausing Netflix.

“She speaks!” Jaleel sarcastically yells.

“I don’t want this name; I just want to be a surgeon. I do not want their help! I want to get into an awesome program on my own!”

Tahani pats her on the back.

“Oh trust kid, I understand. Dad is the best neurosurgeon in Virginia and I’m a vascular surgeon in the marines. Zola is a kickass trauma surgeon; Estelle, Malachi and Asher want nothing to do with the medical field. All of this is being thrown at you, mom and dad just want to help,” Jaleel explains.

“I know they want to help, but I need them to understand I do not want them setting up meetings at hospitals. Dad wants me to be Chief Resident as soon as I get out of med school. I don’t want that, I want to be a surgical intern just like everyone else.”

“Well you would be a little more advanced than everyone else anyways, you’re a walking medical journal,” Tahani mutters and Amara pushes her.

“Mars, you’re going to be-“ someone yelling in the background causes Jaleel to turn away from the camera to respond to him or her. “Well crap, I got to go Amara, we have incoming traumas.”

“Okay, I’ll talk to you soon,” Amara sighs as Jaleel’s face disappears from the screen.

Tahani looks at Amara, “You still feel like crap when you argue with him don’t you?”

“Yes,” Amara whines.

Tahani pats her arm, “You want to order pizza?”

Amara rolls her eyes at Tahani, “I literally just ate but it’s nice to have you back.”

Tahani jumps off the bed and struts out of the room.

“Where going!” Amara shouts.

“Where’s your laptop?” Tahani shouts back.

“In here, on the desk that you walked by?”

Tahani stomps back into the room and goes to the desk, “Why do you have all of this?” She asks referring to Amara’s many Apple devices.

“Well the iMac is there for me to do my homework, and it’s closer to the whiteboard. The MacBook is for when I venture out of my cave, and into another part of the house. My iPad mini is for when I go to class, the iPod is for when I go running and-,”

“Okay I get it Amara,” Tahani puts her hand up. She unplugs the MacBook and walks out of the room with it.

“Ooh look at me. I’m Amara _Elizabeth_ Kingston and I have Apple products,” Tahani mocks.

“Shut it Android!” Amara rolls off the bed and walks to where Tahani is perched in the kitchen.

“What’s your password?”

“ZJEMAA26,” Amara replies plopping down on the seat.

Tahani once again rolls her eyes at Amara and types it in, “What’s the difference between Android and Apple?” Tahani asks.

Amara lets out a laugh, “That’s the thing, they’re both technically the same. Apple let’s out a promo stating they’re about to release a new phone. Android gets amped up, and they rush to release their crappy phone first. Crappy phone then has some malfunctions, and Apple does something better than what Android put out. Android usually has to recall the phone, and then release a less crappy phone.”

“And one costs more than the other,” Tahani sighs.

“The only annoying thing about having all of the Apple Products is that they all ring. When I get a phone call, the Mac rings, iPod rings, iPad rings, it’s so aggravating.”

“Like on a scale from one to ten how aggravating?” Tahani laughs.

“Twelve, that’s why all of them are muted except for my phone.”

“You’re such a weird child, do you want pizza or no,” Tahani says logging onto the Pizza Hut website.

“Yes please, get the dinner box.”

“I want my own pizza, so I’m getting the one that comes with two,” Tahani says. She proceeds to add black olives, banana peppers, bacon and spinach while Amara watches in horror.

She gags, “I think I’m going to be sick.”

“Oh shut up,” Tahani grunts.

“I just want ham and tomato with extra cheese. It’ll be my lunch tomorrow.”

“You put tomato on your pizza?”

“You put all of that on yours?” Amara gestures towards the screen.

“Point,” Tahani clicks onto the breadsticks and changes it to cheese sticks, then she checks out. “I’ll get the tip if you buy.”

“Uh no, I’ll get the tip, you pay.”

“My wallet is downstairs,” Tahani whines kicking her feet.

“Go get it?”

“No,” Tahani whines again.

“Oh jeez, you’ve gotten lazy over the years. We used to run five miles every other day before school. Your ass was in shape, what happened to you?” Amara demands.

“I didn’t have a pain in my ass every day to get me to eat right. I haven’t been eating too crazy though, I alternate between egg and rice, peanut butter toast, cinnamon swirl bagels and waffles for breakfast.”

“The waffles are a no, unless you make them.”

“Eggo waffles,” Tahani mutters.

“Yeah I need you back in here. You’re moving in downstairs until Kennedy leaves.

“But can you get my wallet,” Tahani asks quietly.

“No! Get your ass down those stairs Zaver!” Amara shouts standing up.

“Oh no,” Tahani mutters.

“Oh yes!” Amara replies. “Let’s go, get down the stairs. I want to see those knees up!”

Tahani slides off the barstool and jogs all the way down the steps. She jogs in place as she locates her wallet.

“Let’s go Zaver!” Amara shouts.

“I have to find it first!” Tahani yells back.

Tahani huffs and spots her wallet on the floor, she grabs it and jogs up the stairs, Amara meeting her at the top.

“What time is your first class tomorrow?” Amara asks.

“Um, ten-thirty, I think? Why?” Tahani asks trying to catch her breath. She goes to sit down back at the table and puts her credit card information in the spot.

She pauses noticing Amara has not moved or responded.

“Amara?” Tahani turns in her seat where she finds Amara grinning madly.

“What is wrong with you? Tahani asks.

“That is so perfect, you don’t even know. Order the pizza,” Amara says jumping down to her room to hook back up to the machine.

Tahani shrugs at Amara’s weirdness; she orders the pizza and goes in the living room to turn the television on. Eventually Amara comes back in dragging the cart to sit at the top of the stairs, and she plops on the couch as well.

When the pizza arrives twenty minutes later, Tahani eats four slices, two cheese sticks and three cinnamon sticks. Amara watches Tahani eat it all with an evil glint in her eyes.

~~

Amara wakes up at six-forty five a.m., unhooks herself, brushes her teeth and puts on her work out clothes. She puts her hair up in a braided halo and slips on her running shoes. She then gets out another set of workout clothes, with a waist trainer and another pair of running shoes. She hopped down the stairs to the basement and set the clothes on the countertop in the bathroom. She grabs the air horn from under the sink and drops the shoes walking to where Tahani was snoring.

She heaves in a breath and presses the air horn, “Time to rise and shine Zaver!”

Tahani shrieks and falls out of the bed gasping for air, “What the hell?”

“Up, up, up! Let’s go!” Amara keeps yelling tooting the air horn obnoxiously. Tahani scrambles to her feet and stumbles to the bathroom.

“You got five minutes to brush your teeth and get ready.”

“I feel like I’m back in high school,” Tahani mumbles around her toothbrush.

“In high school your parents woke you up and made you meet me at the playground,” Amara points out.

“How you turned a playground into an obstacle course, we’ll never know,” Tahani spits out her toothpaste and Amara holds her head up.

“Don’t get back in the bed either,” Amara walks up the stairs. “Bear! You want to go for a run? Leash.” Amara commands.

Bear scrambles to his feet tail wagging and went searching for his harness and leash. Amara picks up the landline and calls Nathaniel knowing that he had been awake for hours.

“Yes Miss Amara?” Nathaniel picks up on the second ring.

“Tahani, Bear and I are going for a jog if y’all want to tag-a-long,” Amara says.

Bear comes running back nudging Amara in the leg; she cradles the phone against her shoulder and kneels down to fasten Bear’s harness and leash.

“Oh, I already went for a jog Miss Amara, thank you, but I’ll wake Paul and tell him to trail you,” Nathaniel, says.

“Okay cool,” Amara hangs up the phone and adjusts Bear’s collar.

“Too tight or too loose?” Amara asks Bear. She sticks her fingers in between the collar and pulls.

“Alright then. Tahani, Bear got dressed faster than you!” Amara yells. Tahani’s groaning could be heard from upstairs, and then the sound of her feet on the stairs.

“Bear is an overachiever,” Tahani mutters sticking her tongue out at him.

“You leave my dog alone,” Amara grabs Bear’s leash and walks to the front door.

~~

Tahani falls dramatically on the floor when Amara opens the door to the house almost three hours later.

“Oh God, this is how I die. I can’t feel my legs,” Tahani cries out.

Bear stands over Tahani and licks her face before going to his water bowl.

Amara rolls her eyes at Tahani’s antics, “Oh get up.”

“No I can’t move! How in the hell did you hold the human flag pole position for almost three minutes?”

“I work out,” Amara stands in the superhero pose.

“And how the hell did you reach the top of the swings to do pull ups?”

“I jumped?”

“You’re five one!”

“And you’re five ten,” Amara deadpans. “I told you I’m getting you back in shape. We barely did two miles Tahani. It’s going to take a while to get you back up to five.”

“I’m in law school!” Tahani shouts sitting up.

“I’m was in med school for six years, what’s your point? You think I like staying up till almost midnight and then getting up at six o’clock?”

“Well no but-“ Tahani gets up off the floor.

“No bump that. I’m trying to keep myself healthy so that when I get a new kidney there is no chance in hell that my body is going to reject it!” Amara yells, Bear whines from where he’s lying down.

“Amara-“ Tahani tries again.

“I know you’re in perfect health, but you can get fat in college, fast. They don’t call it the freshmen fifteen for no reason. You need to take care of yourself.”

“Okay Amara I get it,” Tahani tries going in for a hug but Amara dodges her pushing her arm away.

“You stink you’re not touching me,” Amara turns and walks to her room to take a shower.

 


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Ooh what episode is that?” Josephine asks.  
> “Hold on,” Julian watches a little bit. “Dude it’s the pig episode!”  
> “Are you serious! What channel?”  
> “ION,” Julian says hurriedly.  
> “I love the pig episode, I mean it was kind of jacked up but it was so awesome,” Josephine mutters.  
> Julian huffs a laugh and gets back up to get a bowl of pasta. He fills his bowl and turns the stove off and then goes to sit back down and watch television with his sister.

“Did Amara make Kennedy take a cab?” Lou asks from behind Julian causing him to jump.

“Yeah?”

Lou gasps, “Do you know why?”

“No?”

“Okay, what do you know?” Lou frowns.

“That they do tip awesomely; I also know they were arguing about something when I brought them their checks. Amara said something about Kennedy not knowing what no meant.”

“That’s gossip!”

“How? I don’t even know what they were arguing about.”

“So? All we have to say is that they had an argument and the media will do what they want with that,” Lou shrugs.

“Who is this ‘we’ you keep referring to?” Julian frowns at her.

“You and me duh,” Lou slaps his arm.

“Why would I go to media and tell half-ass stories? And why would you want to?”

“Do you know how much money you get for turning in stories?”

“You literally have no idea what happened! What are you going to say hmm? Amara Kingston and best friend Kennedy had an argument at The Palace?” Julian crossed his arms. “Amara made Kennedy take a cab home, so what?”

“You’re no fun,” Lou pouts and walks back to the kitchen leaving Julian to clean up the table by himself.

Julian stacks the plates on top of each other and stuffs the utensils in the cups. A napkin falls to the floor and Julian sighs and bends down to pick it up.

He opens the folded napkin and his eyes widen at what he sees.

_Call her_

_449-5640_

_KO x_

Julian looks around and whispers, “Kennedy gave me Amara’s number.”

 He stuffs the piece of paper in his apron and finishes cleaning off the table rushing to the kitchen.

 _What am I supposed to do with this? Why did she even give it to me?_ Julian pauses in his thoughts.  _I sound like a chick, pull it together._

Julian huffed a breath and stopped pacing. He squared his shoulders and pulled his phone out of his apron opening the messaging app.

“What the hell do I even say?” Julian asks out loud.

“Say what to who?” Lou asks causing Julian to let out a manly shriek.

“Stop doing that!”

“Yeah okay, what are trying to say to someone?”

“Nothing,” Julian replied quickly.

“Julian Brooks,” Lou narrows her eyes.

“Louise Herring,” Julian said.

Lou stuttered as he used her full name, “Give me your phone.”

“Dude no, it’s my phone, play with your own phone.”

“Who were trying to text?” Lou stomps her foot.

“None of your business!”

“Why won’t you tell me who it is?”

“I’m sorry am I under arrest?”

“What? No?” Lou said clearly thrown off.

“Then piss off,” Julian walked passed her and back out to the floor. He spotted the new girl hovering in the corner and he could feel his face twisting. He wandered back over to Macy at the bar and stayed with her until it was almost time to close.

~~

When Julian reaches his studio apartment, he drags his feet to his couch and face plants. Toby, his cocker spaniel pawed at his legs.

“Yes Toby, it has been a long day,” Julian absently rubs his hand over Toby’s head. Heaving a breath Julian stands from the couch and refills Toby’s food bowl and water dish.

He stands in the kitchen, “What shall I eat for dinner? Chef Boyardee that will take five seconds, but I’ll have to cook again tomorrow or should I actually cook myself spaghetti?

“Ah screw it,” Julian walked to his pantry and pulled the penne noodles and red sauce down.

He tossed the package of ground beef in the microwave, and grabbed the bell peppers and onions from the refrigerator. Putting the water on to boil, Julian began chopping.

His phone ringing somewhere inside the apartment made him groan, “Well I hope they call back because now I got to go find it.”

He wipes his hands off on the towel, and goes hunting. It rings again making him dig underneath the sofa cushions.

   He swipes when he finds it, “Hello?”

   “’S happenin’?” his older sister, Josephine said as a greeting.

   “I am making spaghetti,” he put his phone on speaker.

   “Do you know how to make anything that doesn’t involve noodles?”

   “I make my own French fries, French toast, hamburgers, pancakes slash waffles, and chicken parmesan,” Julian says sassily.

   He could feel Josephine’s eye roll through the phone, “Okay smart ass.”

   “You know you love me,” Julian cries as the microwave beeps.

   “How was work little brother?”

   “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” Julian unwraps the ground beef and puts it in the pan.

   “Try me,” Josephine challenges.

   “Today I met Amara Kingston and her friend Kennedy.”

   Silence answered him.

   “Josephine you still there?” he looked at the phone.

   The line clicked as she hung it up and seconds later, his phone rang with a FaceTime request.

   “Julian Easton Brooks,” Josephine’s face was close to the camera.

   “Josephine Elaine Brooks,” Julian raised an eyebrow.

   “You do not joke about meeting Amara Kingston.”

   “That’s why I wasn’t joking, I told you that you wouldn’t believe me.”

   “Say it again, you have a tell.”

   Julian put his face near the camera, “Tonight I served Amara Kingston and her friend Kennedy at the place I work which is The Palace.”

   “Son of a bitch!” Josephine shrieked and disappeared from the screen.

   “Um Josephine? Where’d you go?”

   “I fell down,” she reappeared in the screen.

   Julian rolled his eyes at her antics, “Besides what I already know about the fire, why is Amara Kingston such a big deal?”

   “Do you know who her dad is? Her mom? What Amara herself does?”

   “I know her dad is a doctor? And I think Lou said her mom was a CEO of some company, and has a lot of influence in politics.”

   “Her dad is  _the_ doctor Julian, he’s the best neurosurgeon on the entire east coast. Her sister Zola is also a doctor but she’s a plastic surgeon. Amara wants to do orthopedics and general so she can have a wide variety. But you won’t really think Amara is that famous unless you’re into all those YouTube stars, and business world nonsense.”

   “Okay? Famous doctor family?” Julian asks scooping the ground beef into a pan with the sauce.

   “Julian no! Are you listening? Only her dad, older sister and she are doctors,” Josephine sighs. “Amara has four other siblings.”

“There are six of them?” Julian asks.

   “Yeah, her oldest brother Jaleel is technically a doctor, but he’s in the Marines. Zola, one of the sisters, is a bomb ass plastic surgeon. The other sister Estelle is following behind her mom and is going into politics. Amara’s twin, Adrian is some math genius at Princeton. And the other brother, Malachi is getting his teaching degree e.”

   “Why do you know all of this?”

   “I know everything,” Josephine says grinning.

   Julian rolls his eyes; technically his sister did know everything. She had a photographic memory and she was a bookworm.

   “Can I come over? I want some spaghetti,” Josephine pleads.

   “No, then you’ll try to pawn it off to your husband and kid saying that you made it,” Julian accused.

   Josephine gasped in mock outrage, “I never!”

   “Really Jo?” Julian asks. The water started bubbling and he poured the box of penne noodles into the pot.

   “Ew! Do not call me Jo! You know I hate when people shorten names!” Josephine squeals.

   “You call me Jules every day,” Julian deadpans.

   Josephine narrows her eyes “Shut it.”

   “You can’t have my spaghetti or my dinner rolls.”

   “This is why you don’t have any friends.”

   “I have plenty of friends!”

   “Name three!” Josephine dares.

   “Lou, Ezekiel, Orion and Toby.”

   “Toby is your dog! And Ezekiel technically isn’t your friend, he’s your work friend, so is Lou. And I honestly don’t know how Orion tolerates you.”

   “So,” Julian shrugs

   “You are the most antisocial boy child I know.”

   Julian opens his mouth to protest being called antisocial but stops short, “Did you just call me a boy child?”

   “Sure did,” Josephine says grinning.

   “I don’t want to speak with you anymore, put my niece on the line,” Julian says. He turns the sauce on low once it started bubbling, and continued stirring the noodles.

   “I will not! You are going to talk to me!”

   “But I don’t want to talk to you, I want to eat my spaghetti in peace.”

   “Why are using so much salt?” Josephine sidetracked.

   “I’m not.”

   “Yes you are, I know you put salt in the sauce even though you used that Italian seasoning in the meat. Plus I also know that you salted the water, heavily might I add, so that it would boil faster.”

   “Shut it dork.”

   “You need to watch your salt intake!”

   “Oh shut up!” Julian snaps.

   “You shut up!”

   “Babe stop arguing with your brother!” Josephine’s husband, Lonnie, says from the background.

   Josephine turns around quickly in the seat to glare at her husband, “Traitor!” Josephine shouts.

   “Daddy is not a ‘tray! Mommy you sorry!” Josephine’s three-year old Elaine shrieks.

   “Look what you did Julian, you’ve upset my womb nugget,” Josephine turns back around to face him.

   “I did no such thing, you’ve done this to yourself,” Julian sasses. He scoops up a noodle with the fork and tosses it in his mouth.

   “Why are you and Jessica so mean to me,” Josephine whines.

   “We have to team up against you, she’s the middle child and I’m the youngest,” Julian says. He picks up the noodle pot and dumps the noodles into the strainer that’s in the sink. He tosses them a couple of time and brings them back to the stove and dumps the noodles in with the sauce and meat.

   “Are you still obsessed with parsley?” Josephine asks.

   “I love the parsley,” Julian says shaking parsley into the pot. He mixes it together and turns the eye to simmer. Washing his hands quickly, he picks up the phone and plops down on the couch in the living room.

   “What are you going to make for dinner?” Julian asks flipping through the channels.

   “Good question, maybe we’ll order out,” Josephine says thoughtfully.

   “You need to stop eating out so much.”

   “I have the cookbooks, you bought for me, and I have the ingredients for at least half the meals. But when I get off work, finish grading papers I do not feel like cooking,” she groans.

   “Oh the life of a fifth grade teacher,” Julian says sarcastically. He stops flipping the channel when he catches a glimpse of Emily Prentiss.

   “Ooh what episode is that?” Josephine asks.

   “Hold on,” Julian watches a little bit. “Dude it’s the pig episode!”

   “Are you serious! What channel?”

   “ION,” Julian says hurriedly.

   “I love the pig episode, I mean it was kind of jacked up but it was so awesome,” Josephine mutters.

   Julian huffs a laugh and gets back up to get a bowl of pasta. He fills his bowl and turns the stove off and then goes to sit back down and watch television with his sister.

~~~

   Julian wakes up with a startled grunt and sat up quickly, “What the hell?” he mutters.

   He picks up his phone and sees that it was only seven a.m., Julian stands slowly, grabbing the pasta bowl from the table and brings it to the kitchen.

   “Why?” Julian says seeing the mess from last night, well semi-mess.

   Julian works on cleaning up the kitchen. He adds bleach to his dishwater to get rid of the red sauce stains. Cleaning off the stove, he dumps the pasta into a container and tosses it in the refrigerator. He sweeps the floor and calls it good.

   “Toby? Where art thou?” Julian calls. Soon he hears Toby’s paws skidding across the hardwood.

   “Outside?” Julian asks when he comes into view. Toby immediately starts spinning and whining.

   “Well let’s go then,” Julian slips on his slides and opens the door.

   They ride the elevator down to the first floor and Julian checks the mail while Toby did his business.

   “I just got paid,” Julian sings when he catches sight of his second work check.

   “Let’s go Toby, I can go grocery shopping before I go to class,” Julian says. “Wait did you poop?”

   Julian looks in the grass and then stares back at Toby, “Did you poop out here or inside?”

   Toby spins and runs up to the apartment building.

   “Tobias! I swear if you pooped inside, you are going down mister.”

   When they get back up to the apartment, Julian does a quick search of the apartment and finds no poop. He points fingers at Toby, and then goes to take a shower and get dressed for the day.

   “Okay Toby, don’t throw any parties while I’m away and do not poop inside,” Julian says to Toby who is very much asleep in his dog bed.

   Julian leaves the apartment and goes to get in his Toyota and he heads to Kroger’s. While at a stoplight he spots two girls and a large German shepherd running. Well one girl running while the other girl struggled to keep up.

   “Let’s go Tahani! Suck it up!” the running girl, who sounds like Amara, is yelling. Julian does a double take but he can’t see the girls face.

   “Screw you Amara!” the girl, assumingly Tahani, yells back.

   Julian squints, but laughs again when the dog circles back for the third time and goes in-between Tahani’s legs and trips her. Julian could hear Amara’s loud laugh across the field.

   The light turns green, and he pulls into the Kroger parking lot and finds a spot. He grabs a cart and gets to work on his shopping.

   Two hundred eighty-one dollars later Julian has food for the next month or so; he loads the groceries into the back of his truck and rides to the cart to the cart return.

   When he gets back to the apartment he goes upstairs to get the red wagon from the closet, and brings it back down to the truck.

   He loads the groceries into the wagon and the few that don’t fit in the wagon, he carries them upstairs in his arms.

   He puts everything in its rightful spots and trades his sweatpants in for a pair of jeans. Grabbing his backpack, he slips his laptop inside and jogs back to the elevator and heads to his ten o’clock class.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amara gets injured, hospital visits, Julian finds out that Amara goes to the same school as him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys, sorry it took so long for this chapter to be posted. I also changed names again (oops) I promise! This is the last time. Leave me some feedback?

Arriving at her ten-thirty medical course, Amara gets in her group for the class. She liked the group of people that were assigned at the beginning of the course Nick and Wesley Abernathy who were twins, Parrish Evers, and Madison St. Cloud.

“Is she here yet?” Amara asks plopping down on the barstool.

“No,” Nick and Wesley reply together causing them to glare at one another.

“Did you review the chapter?” Parrish asks.

“Yeah, I was sort of confused by some of the terminology, but I looked up different wordings from different University’s and got it,” Amara pulls out her notebook.

“You should definitely scan those notes to me,” Parrish eyes Amara’s notebook.

Amara laughs, “I will.”

“Whenever I hear another ‘osis’ I get a little more terrified,” Nick says.

“We just had to pick pre-med as a major. The future doctors of America everyone,” Parrish gestures around the room.

“True that,” Amara sighs.

“Hey guys!” Madison pops up.

Wesley groans, “Why are you so perky?”

“I’ve had four cups of coffee, and I drank a Red Bull before I came to class,” Madison replies.

“You’re going to have a sugar crash,” Amara laughs.

“Eh, I’ll be fine, got to stay awake to save lives!” Madison cheers.

“Well, you aren’t saving any lives yet Miss St. Cloud,” Doctor Donovan says silencing the class.

Everyone’s eyes follow Doctor Donovan’s figure, “When and only when you graduate and get accepted into a surgical program, maybe your attending will let you save a life,” she continues. “You all have another two semesters with me until you are allowed to do so. Let’s get started.”

~~

When one o’clock rolled around, Amara was dead on her feet and her head was throbbing.

“Hey are we going to get together Thursday night and study?” Madison asks shoving her laptop in her bag.

“Um we’ll be late but we can make it,” Wesley replies.

“Same, I have dance until six o’clock, but I can make it there by six-forty-five,” Parrish says.

“Well I’m good, let’s go for seven o’clock in the commons area. Until Thursday,” Amara salutes them and walks outside.

   She breathes in and sets her backpack on the bench when the sun hits her face. She stretches cracking her neck and back. She shakes loose and bends to pick up her backpack.

“Amara?” someone calls.

Turning at the slightly familiar voice, she’s met with Julian’s face, she frowns, “What are you doing here?”

“I go here?” He shrugs, “What are you doing here?”

“I go here,” Amara deadpans.

“What a small world,” Julian says.

“Not really, are you new here? I have never seen you on campus,” Amara asks.

“Uh no, we had an Astronomy class last semester. I’m working towards my second degree,” Julian explains, and then squints. “And you’re pre-med.”

“Were you asking or confirming?” Amara counters. She’s very confused on how she missed him all these years.

“What class did you just get out of?” Julian asks.

“Just my one medical class today, it’s a four hour class.”

“Holy crap, why four?”

“It’s medical school, it could be every day for four hours, but it’s not so that’s a blessing.” Amara says. “I’m rolling out; my bed is calling me.”

Julian visibly falters, “Ah, okay. Maybe see you tomorrow?” He asks hopefully.

“Maybe,” Amara walks away from him to the sidewalk where she parked, upfront today. Knowing that Tahani will not be home when she gets there, she plans for a shower then the bed.

Unfortunately, life has other plans; Kennedy’s Honda is in the driveway when Amara pulls in fifteen minutes later.

“I just wanted to sleep,” Amara whines, she grabs her backpack and slides out of the car.

She tries to avoid talking or looking at Kennedy, she does, but Kennedy is as persistent as she is annoying.

“Amara please!” Kennedy pleads, “I’ve been sitting here since twelve-fifteen, you’re going to talk to me!”

“Uh no, the only thing I’m doing is taking a shower and going to sleep. Piss off,” Amara says. She walks to the front door but Kennedy grabs her wrist.

“Oh you do not want to play this game today Kennedy. Get your hands off me, right now,” Amara seethes.

“No! You can’t just kick me out because you’re pissed at me! This isn’t how this work!” Kennedy shouts.

Amara yanks her arm out of Kennedy’s grip but cries out when her shoulder dislocates.

“Oh my God Amara!” Kennedy shrieks.

“Nathaniel! Paul!” Amara wails loudly hot tears welling up. “Get away!”

Nathaniel and Paul come running from the back.

“Get her away!” Amara cries bent over, “My shoulder is dislocated.” Her shoulder had dislocated forward this time.

“Nathaniel take my backpack, it’s putting more pressure on my arm,” Amara demands.

“Miss Amara-“

“Do it!” Amara screams.

“Amara! I’m so sorry, I forgot!” Kennedy cries.

“Miss Kennedy please get in your car,” Paul instructs herding Kennedy towards her vehicle.

Amara lets out another cry when Nathaniel pulls her backpack off.

“Okay now straighten me up, and maybe my shoulder will roll back into the socket,” Amara grits her teeth.

“Okay you ready?” Nathaniel puts his hands on Amara’s waist and moved her up slowly.

“Can you get one of the barstools from out the kitchen?” Amara asks Nathaniel.

“Miss Amara they want to know what medications you take, I know you got taken off a few,” Paul says on the phone with nine-one-one.

“It’s in my wallet,” Amara nudges her backpack with her foot and winces at the jolt.

Paul digs around in the backpack, and pulls out her medical ID card from the wallet. He quickly reads off the medications to the dispatcher. Nathaniel comes back out with the barstool and her to-go bag of dialysis solution, just in case they keep her overnight.

Sirens wailing in the distance cause Amara to let out a sigh of relief as her shoulder shifts downwards when she sits. Kennedy who was still hovering in her car moves to the other side of the driveway to let the ambulance through. The firefighters and paramedics all jump from the vehicles and rushed towards Amara.

“Hello Miss Kingston, how are we doing today?” one of the paramedics asked.

Amara huffs a laugh, “Well my shoulder is dislocated so I’m as well as I can be.”

“My name is Darrel and this is my partner Isaiah. Can you tell us how you dislocated your shoulder?”

Amara nods towards Kennedy, “She grabbed me because she was pissed that I wouldn’t talk to her.”

“Are we pressing charges?” Darrel asks.

Amara shakes her head slightly, “Not worth my time.”

One of the firefighters had grabbed the medical bag, and they start working on Amara.

“Okay Miss Kingston, we’re going to start you on an IV with some morphine-“ Darrel started.

“No, you can’t use morphine or anything with ibuprofen in it. And let’s put the big needle away and grab the butterfly, my veins run,” Amara interrupts.

Darrel nods and switches tactics, “Alright butterfly needle and no ibuprofen. Isaiah I think we have some Tylenol three in one of the other kits.” Isaiah nods and rushes off.

“Also don’t tell them where you’re going or they’ll run away and then you’ll end of poking me more than once and neither of us want that,” Amara nods her head seriously.

“Will do,” Darrel chuckles and wipes her arm with the alcoholic wipes and searches for a vein.

“Alright, one two stick,” Darrel pushes the needle in and his eyes widen a second later. “You weren’t joking, they jumped.”

“They’re dicks like that. Hey Nathaniel?” Amara calls.

“Yes ma’am,” Nathaniel responds pushing off the wall.

“See if you can reach Tahani, she should have a break in between classes right now. Let’s call one brother and one sister and tell them that we’re going to the hospital,” Amara tells him. “Ow, dude. I thought we agreed no meanness?”

“Sorry Miss Kingston, I thought I could get it. You mind if I try your hand?” Darrel asks.

“Wherever you find a vein, you may stick,” Amara sighs.

“Alright then,” Darrel laughs and prepares another needle.

Isaiah comes bustling back, “I had to look in three different kits for the Tylenol III, we need that stocked in every case, even the main one.”

“I thought they just restocked the kits?” Darrel asks prodding Amara’s hand.

“Yeah so did I, guess we’re going to have to start stocking them ourselves,” Isaiah huffs.

“Hey watch this. Miss Kingston you ready?” Darrel asks.

“As always,” Amara closes her eyes.

“One two and stick,” Darrel sticks the needle in and wiggles it around.

“Did it just jump?” Isaiah stares intently at Amara’s arm.

“Yep, that’s the second time,” Darrel sighs pulling the needle out.

“Last time they couldn’t find a vein, they just made me sniff it up my nose,” Amara informs helpfully.

“Really?” Isaiah says shocked.

“Yeah, they poked me three times before they did though. Unfortunately you do not get three sticks, go get the stuff to go in my nose,” Amara shoos him.

Darrel rushes to the truck leaving Isaiah standing awkwardly in front of Amara.

“Tiny or bad veins?” Isaiah asks.

“Both! Whenever I go in for my appointment, they have all the weapons ready; the ultra sound thing, the heating pads, and the other ultra-sound machine thing that I loathe with a passion plus nurse Krista. They claim she’s the best, but she hasn’t poked me yet, they usually get it with the first ultra sound machine,” Amara explains.

“So we can safely say that you’re used to it?” Isaiah asks amused.

Amara shrugs.

“Okay Miss Kingston, when you feel the liquid in your nose, inhale as hard as you can,” Darrel says walking back.

He puts the tubed-syringe up her nose, “Ready?” Amara nods and he pushes the medicine in.

It burns the back of her throat as it runs down.

“Awesome job, one more,” Darrel grabs another and puts it up and it burns even worse than before.

Amara breaks into a coughing fit, and then her eyes well up again with tears from the jolts.

“Alright, all done, are you able to lift your arm so we can get it in a sling?” Isaiah steps forward with the sling in hand.

“No, it went forward this time but when I sat down it went downwards,” Amara explains.

Screeching tires cause Amara to look up to see Tahani quite literally falling out of her Bug shrieking, “What the hell happened?”

Amara kicked to where Kennedy was still sitting in her car as explanation.

“Paul get her,” Amara rasps out when Tahani starts walking in Kennedy’s direction. Tahani easily dodges Paul’s arms and stalks towards Kennedy.

“Uh, do we need to call the cops?” Isaiah asks tentatively.

“Unless Kennedy is dumb enough to have the doors unlocked, no,” Amara responds.

“Open the damn doors you crazy bitch!” Tahani screams yanking on the door handle.

“Miss Amara, I couldn’t reach Estelle and Adrian so I called Zola instead and Malachi,” Nathaniel winces when Amara shoots him a glare.

“You would call the crazy siblings. Are you serious right now Nathaniel?” Amara screeches.

Tahani continues to hurl curses at Kennedy.

“Well let’s get moving Miss Kingston,” Darrel states quickly when Amara opens her mouth for another tirade.

“How are we going to get her shoulder stabilized enough to get on the gurney?” Isaiah asks.

“Her jacket sleeve!” Darrel yells suddenly.

“What?” Amara asks.

“Grab your sleeve, and lift it when you stand up so that we can get you on the gurney. We’ll leave you like that until we can get to the hospital,” Darrel explains.

“Sounds good,” Amara grits her teeth and grabs the sleeve of her jacket.

Isaiah pulls the gurney closer so that Amara could slide herself onto it. As soon as she’s on it, Isaiah and Darrel make work of strapping her down and pushing two pillows under her elbow to keep it from slipping.

“Alright let’s rock and roll,” Isaiah says and he and Darrel push the gurney towards the ambulance.

“Tahani!” Amara calls. “Leave the trash alone and get in the ambulance!”

Tahani’s stomps over to Amara and stands behind Paul still glaring heavily in Kennedy’s direction.

“Paul?” Amara calls again, “Make sure Kennedy doesn’t come to the hospital.”

“Yes ma’am,” Paul turns and relays the same information to Nathaniel.

Darrel and Isaiah push Amara in the ambulance and Tahani climbs in behind her. Darrel closes the back door and then runs around to the driver’s side.

~~

When they get to the hospital, Amara and Tahani are rushed into a private room.

“Someone page Ortho, we have a dislocated shoulder,” a nurse says putting a blood pressure cuff on Amara’s arm.

“Hi Miss Kingston, my name is Lily how are you doing today?” the second nurse asks.

“I would love some more pain medication,” Amara sighs.

“Well I need to get a vein from you first. We’re going to need to start an IV, and get you some anxiety meds so that you can calm down. Your blood pressure is a little high,” Lily frowns at the monitor.

“Let me guess, it’s about one-forty right?” Amara guesses and Lily gives her a strange look. “That’s normal, if it increases, then you should be worried.”

Tahani frowns at Lily when she pulls out a frankly large needle, “You need to use the butterfly needle on her.”

“Is that a preference or a need?” Lily asks skeptically.

“A need, she has tiny veins and they run. As you can see, they’ve already poked her twice,” Tahani crosses her arms over her chest.

“Alright then, I’ll be back,” Lily walks out of the room.

“Stop being mean Tahani,” Amara mumbles.

“Oh I’m not being mean on purpose. My anger is solely focused on Kennedy, why was grabbing you like that in the first place?”

“She just wanted to talk and I was brushing her off.”

“So that gives her an excuse to grab you?” Tahani shrieks.

Amara’s retort was cut off by her sister Zola and brother Malachi running into the room.

“What the hell happened?” Zola demands.

“Kennedy dislocated her shoulder,” Tahani says flippantly.

“Where is she?” Malachi asks looking at the monitor, and texting furiously on his phone.

“Tahani! It was not like that! All of you need to chill,” Amara pleads.

“Hopefully far away from here,” Tahani says ignoring Amara.

“Nathaniel and Paul are outside, and I got your dialysis bag from them,” Zola says. “How are you?”

“I’m fine, I could use some more pain meds though; but of course I need a butterfly needle to even get a vein,” Amara waves her hand.

Zola pats her legs, “Why didn’t you go to Richmond Med?”

“Why do you think I didn’t go there?” Amara asks.

Lily comes back in with four tubes filled with liquids but jumps when she looks up.

“Well, we have a full house now,” Lily smiles.

“Just two of them,” Amara sighs.

“I’m calling everyone else, and you’re pressing charges,” Zola says, leaving no room for arguments before she walks out on the phone.

Amara flips a middle finger at her retreating figure.

“Mars, she grabbed you hard enough to dislocate your shoulder,” Malachi says.

“And you know as well as I do that I can reach for the damn remote and my shoulder would dislocate,” Amara snaps.

“That is not a butterfly needle, nor is it the smallest needle you have. Do not stick that in her!” Tahani shouts causing Lily to jump once more.

Amara glances at the large needle in Lily’s hand.

“I uh-,” Lily starts.

“Find another nurse who is contempt enough to follow one simple instruction. Get out!” Tahani points towards the door and Lily scurries out.

Amara stares at Tahani for a moment “Go take a walk.”

“She was going to stick that big ass needle in your arm!” Tahani screeches.

“That doesn’t mean you get to bitch out a nurse!” Amara yells back.

Malachi stuffs his fist in his mouth to keep from laughing at Tahani’s shocked expression.

Her face-hardens and she opens up her mouth for another retort.

“Go!” Amara yells again. Tahani stomps out of the room seething and muttering curses.

Amara sighs, and then picks up the cup that was left on the in-table and chucks it at Malachi. He struggles to balance it in his hands.

“What was that for?” He yells once it’s safely in his hands.

“For not standing up to Zola and telling her not to go and call everyone else!”

“She’s scary,” Malachi whines.

“Weak sauce,” Amara, mumbles.

“Hello Miss Kingston, I heard that you requested a new nurse,” another nurse walks in the room. “My name is Jenna and I’ll be taking care of you for the rest of your stay.”

“Hi there,” Malachi and Amara say together.

Jenna smiles, “So you need a butterfly needle for your IV, and no morphine correct?”

Amara nods.

“Well let’s get started. After I administer your pain medication we’ll need to get some x-rays of your shoulder. Ortho says they’ll wait a couple of hours to see if it will go back on it’s own, but if not you’ll be having a very minor surgery today,” Jenna says ripping open packages.

“Sounds good.”

Zola comes clacking back into the room angrily pushing her phone into her purse, “Mother is upset with you. Dad says that you should’ve come to Richmond Med and Estelle and Adrian send love and they are on the way.”

“Mother is always upset with me,” Amara looks towards the ceiling.

“Well you should call her more often and we wouldn’t have this problem,” Malachi mutters quietly.

“Still heard you douche bag,” Amara snaps.

“Where did Tahani go?” Zola asks.

“Cranky butt over here made her take a walk because she bitched out a nurse,” Malachi says.

“All right Miss Kingston, here we go,” Jenna prepares the needle and Amara’s arm.

As soon as Jenna hits the vein, blood squirts out of the tube and Amara goes into a cold sweat.

“I’m going to need a bag,” Amara mutters feeling nauseous.

Malachi pushes a barf bag under her mouth, and holds it there. Jenna makes quick work of taping down the IV, and then she starts pushing the medication through. Zola pulls a fan out of her purse, and begins fanning Amara while Malachi squeezes her other hand.

“Alright Miss Kingston, give it a few minutes to kick in, and you should be good. Someone from x-ray will bring you up to get a better look at your shoulder,” Jenna informs cleaning up her mess. She tosses it all in the trash and walks out of the room closing the door.

“She could’ve at least cleaned up the blood,” Malachi mutters eyeing the bloodstain on the sheet.

Amara huffs a laugh, “Too bad they can’t put it back in.”

Zola taps Amara’s arm with the fan, “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Okay what now?” Malachi asks.

“Now we play the waiting game,” Amara sighs.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Short Chapter for ya

His phone ringing momentarily distracted Julian from the coffee menu; sending the person to voicemail Julian orders a large Americano with three sugars. Julian steps to the side and pulls his phone from his pocket to see whom he sent to voicemail.

“Oh hell,” Julian mutters realizing the person he sent to voicemail was his mother.

Hesitantly tapping on his mom’s number he listens to the dial tone, and then all hell breaks loose.

“Julian Easton Brooks, did you really send me to voicemail? I was in labor with your ass for eighteen hours and you have the audacity to send me to voicemail? You’ve lost your damn mind.” His mother, Genevieve, answers on the second ring.

Julian holds the phone away from his ear as his mother’s yelling turned into shrieking. The barista called his order out and Julian grabbed his drink and headed to the history building with his mom’s yelling on the line.

“I should’ve just answered the phone,” Julian mumbles into his coffee.

“Don’t you back-talk me young man, I’ve had enough of your mouth!”

 _I haven’t said anything since you picked up the phone!_ Julian wanted to yell.

He continues down the sidewalk to the history building and stands outside and cradles the phone back to his ear when he hears his mom has gone quiet.

“Mother,” Julian says.

Silence.

He pulls the phone away fro his ear and sees that she had hung up.

“What the hell?” Julian asks out loud. “Did you really just call me to yell?”

He sends out a text to Jess.

> Jess: _call ur mother and see what her deal is._

< Jess: _u call her_

>  Jess: _i didn’t even get the chance 2 tlk. I sent her to v-mail b/c I was in line and called her bck 1 min ltr and she yelled at me then hung up_

< Jess: _sounds like mom_

> Jess: _kk so since ur the fav child, and ur abt to make her a gma again u shld call her and soften the blow so I can call her back when I get out of class._

< Jess: _your dumb but ok._

> Jess: _you’re*_

< Jess: _says the one who doesn’t spell out his words all the way??_

> Jess: _love you_

< Jess: _I know_

Julian rolls his eyes and heads into the building for his class. He sits down in his unassigned assigned seat next to his ‘history buddy’ Orion Watts.

“Hey ‘O’,” Julian greets purposefully bumping her arm.

“Hey,” Orion mumbles back scribbling fast on her notebook paper.

“Whatcha doing?” Julian leans over to peek at her paper but her finger pokes him in the forehead pushing him back.

“Orion!” Julian pokes her in the forehead back.

“Shush,” Orion flipped the page and kept scribbling.

Julian huffs and grabs the sign-in sheet from the person in front of him and signs his and Orion’s names and then passes it over her head to the next person.

The door slams shut as Professor Darnell walks to the front of the classroom, “Afternoon everyone!” he greets. “Short class today, I’ve got a doctor’s appointment.”

There were a few cheers from multiple students causing Darnell to roll his eyes.

“Today we’re going to get through as much as chapter forty-five as we can. Then I want you guys to get started on the assignments that I posted on the website, and the readings I expect to be ready for discussions next Tuesday. Now lets get started,” Darnell claps his hands together.

~~

“Son of a bitch,” Julian whines seeing what Darnell posted had posted for them to do.

“Don’t be such a baby,” Orion laughs.

“Do you see this?” Julian gestures at his computer screen.

“Four readings and two extra credit assignments worth twenty points? Dude if anyone fails this class, they truly suck at life; this is the easiest hard class I’ve ever had. Like the amount of work he gives us, yeah it’s a lot, but it also adds up to a lot of points so that if you have missing assignments or low grades, it won’t effect your overall grade” Orion stuffs her laptop and notebook in her backpack.

Julian rolls his eyes at her, “My only thing is that these professors think they’re the only ones who assign six assignments due by the next class session. Everyone is doing that! I have a twelve-page paper, granted I already finished it, but that’s due next week on Tuesday!”

“You’re such a baby,” Orion laughs again.

“Why are all the women in my life so mean to me?” Julian whines.

“There’s only five women in your life, three of them are related to you, and I’m one of them. What did you do to piss the rest off?” Orion asks.

“I actually have no idea why my mother is currently mad at me. Josephine is mad because I did not let her pawn my pasta off to her kid and husband last night, but I think we made up because we watched Criminal Minds together. Jess isn’t really mad at me she’s just bitchy sometimes. Lou is Lou,” Julian shrugs.

“You my friend have issues,” Orion pats him on the shoulder and pushes pass him.

“Don’t be rude!” Julian yells catching up to her. “Also I’m hoping to add another women to my very short list.”

“Who?” Orion stops in her tracks.

“Her name is Amara.”

“Kingston?” Orion shrieks.

“Yes,” Julian questions.

“Wow Jules, go big or go home,” Orion claps her hands together.

“I mean she doesn’t know that I plan on approaching her yet. Her friend Kennedy, but I don’t think she’s really Amara’s friend, she gave me Amara’s number last night. So Amara doesn’t know that I have her number, I haven’t even texted her yet.”

“First who the hell is Kennedy? Second, why did she just _give_ you Amara’s number?”

“Kennedy is Amara’s friend, but I thin she has like a hidden agenda for being Amara’s friend. Also how am I supposed to know the answer to that? I can’t read minds,” Julian shrugs.

“You need to text her,” Orion stops and faces him.

“And say what?” Julian pulls his phone out anyway.

“Introduce yourself first, explain how you got her number, and then maybe ask her out,” Orion says with a shrug.

“You think that Amara Kingston and all the glory she appears to have is just going to say yes to going out with me?” Julian carefully says.

Orion nods, and pushes his phone up in his face, “Get to it home slice.”

Julian takes a deep breath, “We got this.”

> Amara K: hi amara, this is julian, i was your waiter last night. on ur way out, ur friend kennedy gave me ur number sooo, i was wondering if u would like to go on a date with me on friday?

Julian shows the text to Orion for her approval.

“You’re literally so lame, I cannot deal with you. Go ahead and send it,” Orion sighs.

Julian presses send, and then stares at his phone expectantly.

“Dude she’s not going to text you right back, you have to wait.”

“She did say her bed was calling her earlier.”

“Earlier?” Orion shrieks. “Amara Kingston goes here?”

“You didn’t know that?”

“Don’t act like you knew!”

Julian shrugs, “I’ll just wait until later to see if she texted me back. Want to go to Fat Mo’s for lunch?”

“Hell yeah!”

“Let’s go then,” Julian leads Orion to his car so they can get the best burgers on Earth.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hospital, Amara is an over-achiever. Another short chapter

“Kai,” Amara mumbles sounding exasperated.

“Yes Mars,” Malachi looks up from the game he’s playing on his phone.

“Why are you on the ceiling, we’re in public, you can’t do that here,” Amara whispers loudly.

Malachi turns his gaze from Amara to the ceiling, then to Zola who’s also staring at the ceiling.

“Mars are you white girl wasted?” Malachi asks.

“Not for long,” Amara singsongs. “They got the good stuff here, I think I’m going to work here instead.”

“Mother isn’t going to like that Mars,” Zola chides and Amara goes rigid.

Amara laughs, sounding bitter, “Mother doesn’t like anything I do. I could get two M.D’s and like twenty Ph.D.’s and she would _still_ be mad.”

Amara scrunches her face up mockingly, “Elizabeth why couldn’t have gotten _twenty-one_ Ph.D.’s?”

“That’s not true Mars-,” Zola starts.

“Why can’t you be more like Zola and Estelle, Elizabeth? Zola and Estelle were such perfect little girls. Estelle was valedictorian, and Zola was salutatorian and both of them played varsity!” Amara talks right over Zola.

Amara laughs bitterly again, “Did you know that I played three varsity sports trying to please that woman? Captain of softball and track, and co-captain of volleyball, I was in choir, band, math club, debate, and I was on the student council. If I wasn’t playing the sport I was a manager of it! Dude I made straight A’s, I was top three in my graduating class! Do you know how many instruments I know how to play? Twelve. Do you know how many languages I speak on top of English? Nine.  I have a BA, and a PhD on top of a soon to be MD. I have a quite successful following on YouTube, and I even make the little time leftover that I do occasionally have to help out Estelle when she’s helping campaign. I own my own coffee shop on top of going to medical school. And just in case you forgot, _I’m on fucking dialysis._ So tell me Zola, _what else_ can we add to the list of things that mom is mad at me about. _”_

Zola and Malachi stare at Amara in shock at her verbal beating, but don’t try to deny or convince her of anything.

Jenna walks slowly into the room after Amara finishes, pushing a wheelchair, “The x-ray machine is ready Miss Kingston,” she says quietly.

“Okay,” Amara sighs, pushing the sheet back with one hand. Jenna moves the wheelchair closer to the bed and helps her get out of the bed.

Zola comes around to help but Amara stops her, “Just don’t.”

When Amara settles in the chair, Jenna attaches all of the fluid bags to the stand on the chair, and pushes her out of the rom.

Going into the hallway, Amara hears Tahani before she sees her. Jenna pushes her around the corner and Amara sees Tahani badgering Paul and Nathaniel.

“Well do you know where she is or not Paul?” Tahani demands, Paul doesn’t budge. “Paul, you know I would be doing the world a favor if I decked Kennedy Oatham. The Gods themselves will come down and sing praises to me.”

That gets a quick chuckle out of Nathaniel, but he quickly covers it up with a cough and Tahani beams having caught it anyway. “See! You know I’m right!”

“Tahani,” Amara calls, cutting off Nathaniel’s response. “We’re going to x-ray come on.”

Tahani throws a look over her shoulder at Paul and sticks her tongue out as she walks toward Amara. She walks along side the wheelchair babbling about her first day at Western.

Jenna wheels her into the x-ray room, “Okay Miss Kingston, I’ll be back for you as soon as the technician is done with you.”

~~

After the x-ray Amara’s shoulder hurts more even with the pain medication, “Why do they make the patient with a dislocated shoulder lift their arms?”

Jenna laughs, “They want to see all the ligaments in the arm, see how it looks while it’s dislocated. They’re going to do another one after it goes back in just to make sure everything is going okay.”

Jenna wheels her back to the room, where it has gotten more crowded.

“Mars what the hell?” her twin Adrian says when he sees her and Tahani.

“You could’ve called,” Estelle states.

“Nathaniel called both of you and you didn’t answer, so he was forced to call those two,” Amara snaps.

Tahani stifles a giggle into her hand, as she helps Jenna put Amara back in the bed. Which leads to Adrian fussing over her when Jenna walks out of the room.

“You are literally only three hours older than me, why are you babying me,” Amara sighs at Adrian.

“I’m technically a day older than you.”

“No you’re not, stupid,” Amara says.

“Yes I am. It’s not my fault you took your sweet time coming out the womb. Dad says you were reading a book in the womb,” Adrian laughs.

“I don’t think that’s possible.”

Adrian rolls his eyes, “You were born at two o’clock in the morning on March 20th, and I was born at eleven o’clock at night on March 19th. That makes me a day older.”

“It makes you three hours older!” Amara shouts.

“Calm down my dear sister,” Estelle says laughing.

“Why are we talking about birth times?” Malachi asks finally looking up from his phone.

“Amara,” everyone says.

“I did not bring it up! I just don’t appreciate being babied by someone who is only three hours earlier than me!” Amara shouts.

“Shut up, you know we all love to baby you, and you know you love to be babied,” Tahani makes kissy faces at Amara.

“And you! You’re only a month older than me! What the hell?”

“Why do you know how much older everyone is from you? And secondly why do you care,” Estelle asks.

“Don’t worry about it,” Amara states. “Can someone please adjust my pillow, it’s slipping.”

“I got you home slice,” Tahani says hopping up from her perched position on Amara’s bed.

“Be gentle,” Zola says, when Tahani grips the pillow.

As soon as Tahani pushes the pillow back under Amara’s arm, her shoulder rolls back into place and Amara lets out a sigh of relief.

Amara slumps forward, “Oh my Gods.”

“You good Mars?” Adrian asks.

“My shoulder is back in place and I’m high on pain killers. You tell me,” Amara shrugs.

“I’ll go get the nurse, Jenna right?” Zola says quietly.

“Yeah,” Amara sighs as Zola walks out the room.

“Amara, why is Kennedy giving your number out to guys, and why does said guy want to go on a date with you on Friday?” Tahani asks holding Amara’s phone.

“Kennedy did what?” Amara shrieks. “To whom did she give it to?”

“Some dude named Julian,” Tahani says.

Amara freezes clutching the blanket in her hand, “I’m going to commit murder, get the lawyer on speed dial.”

Adrian coos from the couch, “Who’s Julian?” he waggles his eyebrows in her direction.

“Is he your boyfriend,” Malachi singsongs dragging out the word.

“Amara’s got a boyfriend!” Estelle squeals at Tahani shaking her arm.

Tahani simply raises her eyebrows at Amara waiting for an explanation.

“Firstly, he’s not my boyfriend,” Amara snaps. “Secondly, I’m going to commit murder someone should be talking me out of this. Thirdly, Julian was our waiter last night when we went to the Palace; Kennedy probably slipped him my number after I yelled at her. And fourth! He said my hair looked like a poodle!”

“But you want him to be your boyfriend don’t ya?” Estelle asks.

“No I do not,” Amara says.

“Oh, she so does,” Adrian high-fives Malachi.

“Okay, I’m not sure if you all forgot how this sibling thing works, but you’re not supposed to support me getting a boyfriend. You’re not even supposed to want me to have a boyfriend,” Amara snaps.

“Amara, all of the offense but you need to get laid,” Tahani whispers.

Amara snaps her head around to glare at Tahani, “You’re supposed to be on my side! Not theirs!”

“Okay little sis, let’s get a little real,” Adrian says grabbing her hand. “Ever since Ethan happened you haven’t been on any dates, you don’t even look at guys, and you sure as hell do not stay out of your house long enough to even go on a date! And plus I never got to do the whole threatening the boyfriend when you were in high school thing. I’m surprised you even went to dinner last night and stayed long enough to get pissed at Kennedy.”

Amara snatches her hand back, “I don’t go outside because people piss me off. I don’t go on dates because boys are _revolting._ I don’t look at guys because I already know that they’re staring at my ass or my chest and if they can’t even make eye contact with me why should I want to talk to them. And I leave my house to go to class, and make sure that they haven’t burnt my damn café down.”

“Wow Amara, revolting?” Malachi snickers.

Amara rolls her eyes, “Yeah, I was mostly talking about you though.”

Malachi lets out a yell, “Hey!”

“Amara you can’t sit in your house and be a hermit,” Tahani starts.

“I can and I will. Now give me my phone.” Amara holds out her hand for it.

Tahani places it in her hand, and Amara saves Julian’s contact under ‘don’t answer’ and replies.

> don’t answer: _I don’t talk to boys, especially ones that don’t know how to spell._

“When the hell did you get a thigh tattoo?” Adrian shouts catching the sliver of skin on Amara's thigh.


End file.
